Exposing the underbelly of Armstrongism in all of its wacky glory! Nothing you read here is made up. What you read here is the up to date face of Herbert W Armstrong's legacy. It's the gritty and dirty behind the scenes look at Armstrongism as you have never seen it before!
With all the new crazy self-appointed Chief Overseers, Apostles, Prophets, Pharisees, legalists, and outright liars leading various Churches of God today, it is important to hold these agents of deception accountable.
Herbert Armstrong's Tangled Web of Corrupt Leaders
The reason why the latter day Armstrongist prophets score zero in prediction is because of a simple fact. HWA said the key to Biblical prophecy was the identity of Israel. He founded his personal prophetic infrastructure on this identity.
Genetics has kicked the legs out from under this "key". Hence, there is no way for these "prophets" to be anything but wrong.
I hate to harp on this but I wrote the following in response to an earlier post on this blog:
The key to prophecy, according to HWA, was the identity of the modern day Tribes of Israel. An ancillary, but necessary, identity involves Germany as the Assyrians. This prophetic infrastructure has decisively imploded. And anyone who continues to subscribe to this patent medicine sideshow should join the flat earth society.
I will not go into the genetics. I have gotten some push back from this website on the complexities of genetics for this venue. (One BI supporter described genetics as "trivia" and the real proof was the "nation and company of nations" concept. You will notice that BI supporters evince their brain-washed state by not being able to follow logical discourse on this topic.) So let me summarize the conclusion that genetics, a hard and established biological science, gives us:
In spite of coincidental geopolitical events, parallels in history, similarities in the pronunciation of place names, writings by crackpots, arcane allusions in pseudo-history, beliefs that identities have been mysteriously hidden, The Compendium of World History, Herman Hoehs Ph.D from Ambassador College and my-uncle-is-Irish-but-he-looks-just-like-a-Jew, genetics demonstrates incontrovertibly that the Celtic and Anglo-Saxon people of the British Isles are not descended from Israel (and the Germans are not descended from Asshur).
And I can hear it now: "God hid their identify even from scientists." That is rank denial of the most pathetic sort. One should instead consider what God says about those who claim to be Jews and are not. (I know, someone told a big lie at one time that Israel and the Jews are two separate people, hence, the non-sensical statement: "we are not claiming to be Jews but rather Israelites." But a political separation does not create a genetic separation among people with the same origin (descent from Abraham). Don't be dumb for the sake of preserving an absurdity.)
If the key of prophecy is false, HWA's prophetic infrastructure collapses. And this is really not something difficult, mysterious, dark and arcane to understand. What is difficult, mysterious, dark and arcane is the bizarre idea that Celts and Anglo-Saxons, with totally different genetics and migrational histories, could be within the racial pale of Judaism. Any minister basing prophecy on this invalid "key" will inevitably be demonstrated to be false and I feel sorry for his duped followers.
Armstrong legacy was built on tithe slavery! Anything they say amounts to nothing! I am a happy member of the Pentecostal Free-Will Baptist Church and I approve my message!
4.13 PM There is no need to feel sorry for your 'duped followers' because they are not duped. Do you seriously think church members have endured the financial sacrifice and daily mental strain of praying for the work without God intervening to confirm their efforts. Which is why the reasoning and the 'proofs' of Near_Earth_Object and Dennis the spiritual menace is academic nonsense to such Christians.
Oddly enough, I heard last week that Weinland had been afflicted with a really severe headache that wouldn't go away. I understand that he finally had to be MEDEVAC'd to his proctologist.
That's not confirmation, 5:51, it's self-hypnosis. Honestly, even if HWA had been on the up and up, and had had the keys to unlock prophecy, Ron Weinland would still be a false prophet, and a charlatan. He set dates, and they failed. He did wrong, and was jailed. He's old, his ship has sailed. He's finished, his people have bailed. And that should tell the tale!
In my opinion hwa nailed it better than any christian since.
A) you know that the body of scientific proof for christian philosophy is as non existent as bi.
B) bi is founded in reality while christianity is not.
BI in its latest form served to forge a new identity for the elite ruling this world. The 19th century british and french empires were financed by a race deemed cursed an longed for acceptance. With haut finance and benjamin disraeli ruling the largest empire ever there was a flicker of hope.
In my christmas posting I labored to write that in the 1930's a new identity was forged in the coming empire of the USA. People like Irving Beilin forged a secular (dechristianized) christmas as the identity of the american empire was forged through at least 25 songs like white christmas that when you disect the lyrics non of them speaks about jesus.
White christmas, gi's abroad serving the empire and secular jewish songs are intrinsically linked.
I am harping on these cultural mixing of identity since wall street and political power of a people until the 1930's considered in america as non whites with limited immigration quota are known facts.
Oh I forgot to mention the 19th century intermarriagw of jewish and american heiresses into impoverished british elite society.
Later of course protestant britain needed the ideology to support a jewish homeland.
I could go on and on but HWA's writings have more of a chance to come true or at least be on par with historical development in a secular way than any human ever dwell on a cloud in heaven in some philosophical construct.
So yes NEO. Your harping might be scientifically closer to truth although you have never come up with genetic research on 1000 bc bones from israel.
It seems the assumption is that the current inhabitants are genetic descendants of the buried bones.
But even if so.
My description of 19th century british empire and its american successor is accurate and the jews would certainly not oppose an ideology that linked them to the rulers and ruling class and newly forged american culture in a way that would describe them as cousins instead of gettoed vermin (which had been the case for over 2000 years).
I am pretty sure my regular case about protestant identity forge with the identity of the people of israel exiting from the pharaonic / habsburg empire was another powerful piece of propaganda or rather ideology to serve the infamous break up of the catholic european empire and renew in something more dynamic and viable than the middle ages.
As I mentioned before, it was the official doctrine of the two million strong Anglican church during the 1800s that the British empire was Gods fulfillment of His promise to Abraham of a 'nation and company of nations.' The British empire is the largest in human history, yet this and the following American empire is just shrugged off. How honest or objective is that?
While it is difficult to argue a case for BI, it is not helped by the misuse of Scripture in arguing that the throne of Britain is the throne of David. Having said that it doesn’t mean that QEII is not a descendant of David, typology of the Davidic and Stewart Kings suggest this – QEII is a descendant of James Stewart the first King of the Union of the Crowns of Scotland, England and Ireland – Stewart blood runs through the succeeding monarchs, though there were dynastic changes.
It is a misunderstanding in that there are two thrones in Israel and that both have to be occupied to establish the throne of David – the throne of David and the Temple are Jerusalem fixtures. The temple throne was not ‘occupied’ in the Second-Temple period hence no throne of David. This relationship between the Davidic kings and the Temple was established when Solomon built the temple – Davidic royalty are Temple builders and Temple cult patrons.
Ge 17:13 He that is born in thy house, and he that is bought with thy money, must needs be circumcised: and my covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant. Ge 17:14 And the uncircumcised man child whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he hath broken my covenant.
It is a misunderstanding in that an everlasting covenant can be broken, not by God but by people.
1Ki 2:4 That the LORD may continue his word which he spake concerning me [David], saying, If thy children take heed to their way, to walk before me in truth with all their heart and with all their soul, there shall not fail thee (said he) a man on the throne of Israel.
1 Ki 8:25 Therefore O LORD God of Israel, keep for your servant my father David that which you have promised him, saying, ‘There shall never fail you a successor before me to sit on the throne of Israel, if only your children look to their way, to walk before me as you have walked before me’ (NRSV).
There was an “if” clause to the everlasting covenant with the Davidic kings. Both David and Solomon understood this. There is no free pass with God.
Jer 33:14 Behold, the days come, saith the LORD. Jer 33:15 In those days, and at that time Jer 33:17 For thus saith the LORD; David shall never want a man to sit upon the throne of the house of Israel; Jer 33:18 Neither shall the priests the Levites want a man before me to offer burnt offerings, and to kindle meat offerings, and to do sacrifice continually.
Jesus Christ departed Solomon’s Temple (Eze 8-11) and then the human Davidic kings were ‘expelled’ from throne of David until the fulfilment of the Millennial promise of God to Israel through Jeremiah.
Jer 52:31 And it came to pass in the seven and thirtieth year of the captivity of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the twelfth month, in the five and twentieth day of the month, that Evil-merodach king of Babylon in the first year of his reign lifted up the head of Jehoiachin king of Judah, and brought him forth out of prison,
“David shall never want a man” “in those days” implies that David would want for a man to occupy the throne of David since the time of Zedekiah, though Jehoiachin, noted twice in verse 31 as “king of Judah” was of the legitimate line; just as the Levitical priests would want for a man to offer sacrifices during the Babylonian exile and after AD70.
Eze 17:22 ... I will crop off from the top of his young twigs a tender [rak] one, and will plant it upon an high mountain and eminent: Isa 11:1 And there shall come forth a rod [choter] out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch [“netser”] shall grow out of his roots: Isa 53:2 For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant [yoneq], and as a root out of a dry ground... Jer 23:5 ... I will raise unto David a righteous Branch [tsemach], and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth.
The ‘tender twig’ is Ezekiel’s contribution to the ‘horticultural’ expressions used to designate the Messiah.
"As I mentioned before, it was the official doctrine of the two million strong Anglican church during the 1800s that the British empire was Gods fulfillment of His promise to Abraham of a 'nation and company of nations.' The British empire is the largest in human history, yet this and the following American empire is just shrugged off. How honest or objective is that?"
3:43
It becomes problematic when you would use "ideology" of the elites of said empires as "genetic proof. Neo should present evidence that people known as the jews are genetically the same as thousand bc bones from palestine, not its current inhabitants.
If he has that genetic evidence that it becomes more difficult to argue the wandering of those peoples to the british isles.
My point is that it really does not matter. The Roman Empire was born on the myth of a wolf suckling two boys. Why cannot the greatest empires ever be based on a myth that its financiers and elites are cousins to a blessed race holding the oracles of God?
It was a rather modest thought of those protestant british to attribute their wealth to the blessings of God instead of their own doings. And it was even more kind of the Americans to accept jews as their cousins at a time when not a single christian person saw any merit in the "murderers of christ". HWA propagated this very kind andn enlightened myth, which no jew would ever deny although they would rather wrap it in diplomatic terms like "special relationship" to the people of the USA.
Church of God prognosticators get lost in the moment of their prognostications and then comes the future. You can only reset and restart so often convincing the oblivious that God is giving "us" more time. No one ever says, "I apologize. I know I told you to pull big triggers. I was badly mistaken. Refunds are in the mail ".
I will repeat myself yet again. People who believe in BI, because they have been brain-washed, cannot follow logical discourse on this topic.
For example:
1. Enduring "the financial sacrifice and daily mental strain of praying for the work" does not somehow convert objective, scientifically established truth into "academic nonsense".
2. I have not produced genetic research on bones from Israelites from 1000 BC. No doubt this kind of genetic analysis could be done but it superfluous. Christ, a descendant of David who lived in 1000 BC, came to his own. Note he did not come to the British Isles. He came to the Jews of Palestine who have historical, migrational and religious continuity with modern Jews. The implication is that if we were to dig up some bones from Israel at the level of 1000 BC, we would find them to indicate haplogroup R1b (British) instead of haplogroup J (Jewish). This would make modern Jews really Gentiles. And now you are joining up with the odd Anti-Semites who used to haunt the Big Sandy campus.
What supporters of BI now need to do is to demonstrate that the science of genetics, a biological reality from the hands of the Creator, is false. Nothing less will do because it is genetics that wholly invalidates BI. And the BI advocates must use the Scientific Method and not a package of pseudo-history, accumulated anecdote and illogic to accomplish this. Lots of luck!
"Fundamentalists" of any religion or philosophy claim direct results if people would just hearken back to "the perceived original philosophy."
This is impossible since all are changed and influenced through the current circumstances.
If those circumstances do not satisfy through war (civil), rumors of war (cold war) callers for imminent change always surface.
No refunds. We are living in Utopia are we not. I would not compare modern oregonians with the wretched settlers dying on the oregon trail raided by natives and charged by robber cattle barons. 3 tithes are a blessing compared to the lives of our ancestors. Although a tax break can be fun at times.
The biggest proof, one way or another, of the veracity of HWA and those fighting amongst themselves for his mantle, is whether or not the things he said would happen have happened, and within the timeline on which he said they would happen. We can argue forever over the supports or proofs he offered, but the rubber meets the road and gains traction only if what he said comes to pass.
I didn't give him a second chance when 1975 failed. I was there, those of us in my age group who grew up in the church fully expected to live only into our twenties, because that's what the entire church had been taught and believed. When 1972 came, with no sign of the Germans, and no tribulation or Petra, the spin doctors went to work convincing and reprogramming members that we had not been taught what we were taught, that no dates had been set, and that the church was now entering a new phase of the work because we had been given more time to finish the work. Large numbers accepted the reprogramming, even as we see happening today when the prognostications of such people as David Pack and Ronald Weinland consistently fail. And, remember: everyone knew of HWA and GTA. Their message, correct or incorrect, was going out with a power that all of the ACOGs combined cannot even approximate today.
I've said for years that all of the deadlines that this church movement has attempted to impose have been blown. The last possible one involves the symbolism of the tender twig in Jesus' Olivet Discourse representing the rebirth of Israel as a nation. Baby boomers born in 1948 are going to be turning 70 in 2018. The Bible indicates that man's post-flood lifespan is 70 years. How do you reckon the passing of a generation? WCG used to use much shorter spans of time in their interpretation, modifying it along the way to fit their prophecy mold as time eliminated their earlier interpretations. Now, we're at the outer reaches, the last possible redefining, and still no Germans, no tribulation, and no end!
The WW-I and WW-II generation ministers have largely passed. Are the ACOGs now looking at baby boomer generation ministers like Jerry Weston and Dave Pack, and counting on the end coming before they die? At one time, we all expected HWA to lead us into Petra, and to present us to Jesus Christ as He descended to split the Mount of Olives.
Armstrongism as we know it is now in its last possible viable years. Over the past twenty years, we've been watching unconscionable fleecing of miniaturized flocks, grand titles being taken, mini-Herb construction projects, failed dates, and zero effectiveness in getting any sort of message out. You could argue that Evangelicals have been more effective in popularizing the end times than the Armstrong organization ever was. The best hope of the Armstrong movement, best collection of talent, and most demonstrable growth seemed to be centered around Ian Boyne. And, now Ian has passed.
I don't believe that a movement which has racked up so many very public failures can suddenly become like the broken clock, and reach the point at which it is right. That is a false metaphor. The Armstrong movement has proven itself to be more like a completely unreliable watch that runs either fast or slow, and is therefore an inaccurate witness to any timelines which God might have in mind.
NEO is also convincing. Although he should be the first to admit that from a scientific viewpoint his argument about me teaming up is extremely poor.
You should admit that my question on 1000 bc bones is to the point and legitimate. Although I will admit to be in questionable company raising the question.
BB What you religiously insist on is to not individuate Herb and the bible. The two are not one and the same. 1975 was Herb trying to manipulate God to prematurely bring down the curtain on human history in order to hide the failure of Communism at that time. Scratch the surface, and you will find that his church then, and the splinters today are still commie at their core. 1975 is nowhere found in the bible. I will give $10,000 to anyone who can show me this. The prophesys regarding WW3 and the second coming are there for all to read in the bible. You have thrown out the baby with the bathwater. I do watch TV televangelists, and the odd Evangelist does teach that the ten toes are the United States of Europe, but I have not come across one who mentions the tribulation coming to America. In fact Kenneth Copeland insists it will only happen over seas. So no, other denominations are not warning the Anglo Saxons of military defeat and enslavement.
Have a heart! These latter day prophets are just trying to make a buck. And the brinkmanship required is dizzying. First, they must stir up their gullible base by flaunting all the horrors of the future that the base will personally escape if they are generous with their wallets.
Than, when it all fails, they must come up with a creative solution that will explain why the failed prophecy but avoid making them look like patent medicine show salesmen. And their base might lose its gullibility and abandon them at anytime or be drawn away to another false predictor.
And then these latter day prophets have to finally die and face God.
Asked and answered over and over again, 10:11 but somehow you never let it register. Reread my past responses to you on the issues that you have once again raised. Even I become tired of repeating myself!
Per your final paragraph, so far as non-Armstrong evangelists go, while nobody has complete truth, I believe they frequently know things HWA never did, have a deeper understanding, and a more spiritually-developed approach.
Anybody who believes that God has confirmed the capture and subjugation of white Anglo-Saxon nations in a tribulation is simply practicing prayer self-hypnosis. God answers prayers, in fact my cell phone rang this morning during my prayers with an answer to something I had just been requesting from Father God. The thing is, God knows how easily we can be deceived by confirmation bias, and does not answer our prayers in the manner you suggest. If He did, the "confirmation" of my life's mission through a relative's prayer would have kicked in during the 1970s. So, this was a lesson I learned early on. My primary gift over decades has been with machines, and not with church leadership.
Testing of 1,000 BC bones could very much happen in the future, nck.
I'd be more interested in dna testing of the bones of Israelites during Moses' time, during Babylonian captivity, during the intertestamental era of the Hasmonean Kings, and during Jesus' time on Earth, but 1,000 years BC is a good start.
I am shocked to see that a person continuously quoting scientific evidence resorts to extremely poor logic when confronted by a question to provide real proof.
How could you resort to the argument that someone among questionable ilk is not able to ask a legitimate question and worse, how the hell did you resort to quoting the bible to proof a scientific point. That is diminishing your strong argument to scientific crockery. What a shame. Since I love you to bitch regard me as iron sharpening iron and exposing your extremely flawed reasoning. No one said genetic science is untrue. I was just asking if there are links to 1000 bc palestinian bones and the brits. You are aware that among british (unscientific) lore it is said that Jesus walked the blessed hills of england as party to his uncle's Arimethea trade mission.
And I am quoting the unofficial (and unscientific) national anthem of England here. (Not the British anthem). This ideology is sooooooo much bigger than a limited study on genetics.
"And did those feet in ancient time: Walk upon England's mountains green?"
"I do watch TV televangelists, and the odd Evangelist does teach that the ten toes are the United States of Europe"
I'm no evangelist but I can tell you that the "ten toes" are the ten zones that the Club of Rome has conveniently divided the planet into.... Google that.
HIs followers will not care if he is wrong. These people are brainwashed and in need of a leader to tell them what to do. They really do not think for themselves or look into things without being told how to look, where to look and what to see when they do look. The book of revelation was not going to be included in the canon of the Bible because they realized it was all metaphor and fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem and the generation on whom all those things would come as Christ said.
I would like to give you an appropriate response to your post but I can only understand a small fraction of what you write (now and in the past). Apparently, English is not your first language. If you could re-write what you have written and have a native English speaker then correct it, I think I could respond. But otherwise, I don't want to expend effort on answering something of uncertain meaning.
One issue was clear enough to respond to - why do I quote the Bible to prove a scientific point. I do not believe the Bible and science are mutually exclusive in principle. I do believe the Bible is an incarnational document and has suffered in the hands of human editors. I believe there was a Jesus and that he was a Jew and the Jews, both ancient and modern, are haplogroup J. If you want to take exception to the genetics, you will be swimming against the tide of reputable scientists and historians.
If a "davidic" kingship is under discussion. Why would one expressly skip the 1000 bc bones?
Anyway. You' re right there must be some Mosaic slave massgraves in the Egyptian dessert. And bi lore has it that one part split to ireland before the captivity.
Iron age farmers from Ireland are confirmed middle eastern as i ve posted the article many times.
But they do not fit the bi time frame.
One of the reasons I maintain often that HWA was right on everything although in a secular and twisted way and different time frame.
i think it comical that people keep talking about science even though prophecy is being fulfilled...
the jews do dominate their enemies, the arabs have become a great people, God did gather the jews from ethiopia and other places as he Promised and made them to return to the land of israel, jerusalem is a burdensome stone to all what involve themselves with it...
Daniel 11:21 describes donald drumpf to a t; Daniel 11:20 describes obama and how his accomplishments have virtually come to nothing...
soon Christ will actually Return, and all you end time scoffers (yeah, u people were prophesied about too) will simply be dead, not entering into His Rest...
2:27 ~ You wouldn't understand. 1975 was going to serve as the final and ultimate validation to all of us as to whether HWA/WCG was of God. They said that having and observing the correct doctrines (especially the sabbath) meant that they alone were God's little elect group of people, and therefore qualified as being the humans to whom God would reveal the meanings of the endtime prophecies, and the time table. Well, He didn't. So, when their understanding of prophecy proved to be false, it automatically meant that they also did not have the correct doctrines. False teachers can't have anything but false prophecies, and vice versa. The two simply cannot be separated. This is why so many people today either want to revise and deny that HWA ever set dates, or they insist that the prophecies were not false, but just delayed. They blind themselves to the very obvious answer which is that God never had anything to do with HWA.
Deut. 18:22 means that HWA/WCG did not have the witness of God supporting them. As we learned some years later, most likely God allowed Satan to confuse HWA because of HWA's incest with his daughter. So, there were no restored truths, and all ministers who base their teachings on those of HWA are both false teachers, and false prophets. None of their excuses or explanations matter.
So far as God goes, I've got a much healthier and more authentic relationship with Him today than was ever possible back when I believed that WCG was God's one and only. But, I had to first go through a period of cleansing (years of atheism) and fresh restudy of all the doctrines and issues to get rid of the bogussness and anti-Christian practices that were taught in the toxic cult of Armstrongism. I consider myself to be extremely fortunate, and very blessed.
yeah, u science types: use science to explain the phenom of donald drumpf and how in one fell swoop he has managed to defy all convention and logic and become the most powerful man on earth? i look at all these lengthy comments on this blog, vain white papers, as it were, but theres only one explanation as to how a total jackass could possibly take over this nation, and that is a spiritual one and the fulfillment of prophecy..
and history has shown us that his kind could potentially control the masses and compel them to destroy all you what think urselves as superior thinkers...
i have read on this blog those what have claimed that science is winning over religion: clearly that is not true; invisible forces working within men like donald drumpf have elevated him to cult status, threatening the status quo of the last 75 years, including the prominence of the scientific types...
indeed, as it is Written, one of the few sciences the man respects is the science of warfare, i.e., the gods of force (not to mention the art of manipulating the masses through flattery)...
so, while you science types enjoy the last moments of ur glorious rise in recent decades, reflect on how easily this product of invisible force has suddenly risen, and how scientists have become subject to a madman suddenly in control of the purse strings that yeild the funds you rely upon to do ur research and make ur living...
Nck, I proved from scriptures in one of my papers which still exists over in the archives the Painful Truth website that the conditional promise (based on the obedience of his descendents) to David that the throne would never want for one of his heirs was nullified precisely because of the gross continued lack of obedience. No human sits on that throne today. You could argue that Jesus Christ, following His life and death for mankind, sits on it, but the Germans in England's royal family certainly do not.
9.26 PM I think your comment belongs on a different blog, but from a Christian perspective, Trump was voted into office because of the negative consequences of Obama's sinful polices.
NCK, as regards ancient DNA, you can have a look at: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/a16b/033eb96877f84622193adc9e6020b69dd818.pdf
NCK, I had a look at the paper you cite indicating that people from the Middle East brought agriculture to Ireland. The article did not cite their haplogroup but they are apparently now extinct because there are only trace signals of Middle Eastern ancestry in the British Isles. In the British Isles, there is a small amount of E1b which is actually from North Africa in an ocean, otherwise, of R1b and some other western European haplogroups. This same E1b haplogroup occus in many European countries. If you are asserting that the Irish have a Middle Eastern origin based on this article, your assertion fails.
Let me add that when I state the Jews are haplogroup J, I am not saying that this is the one and only haplogroup their population reflects. Intermarriage and assimilation have occurred - especially in more modern times when movements of populations have been facilitated by better transportation. In general, large political units encompass many haplogroups within their boundaries. Germany, for instance, claimed racial purity but in fact they are a composite of many haplogroups. Hitler himself, based on his still living relatives, was haplogroup E1b out of North Africa. Jews are haplogroup J due to numerical predominance, migrational patterns, archaeology and history.
The archetype false prophet was Gerald Waterhouse. He was to idiosyncratic prophetic interpretations what Dean Blackwell was to institutional racism. Waterhouse's free-wheeling, three hour romps through "prophecy" are legendary. He was locked into the standard Armstrongist interpretations but he tended to "ornament" these wild ramblings with his own supporting viewpoints. He once stated that Stanley Rader was going to do the legal work to lease the commercial passenger jets to take obedient WCG members to the Place of Safety. I guess that one failed. And I think he also predicted that HWA would not die before the Second Coming. I guess that one failed. But I would think Waterhouse was just as inspired as the modern day Armstrongist prophets.
I think the modern day fountains of false prophecy feel like they have been credentialed by Gerald Waterhouse. He set the pattern and gave them the sense of liberty to say whatever.
Mapping modern day figures such as Obama and Trump into prophetic statements that have long been fulfilled will not lead anyone to enlightenment. It is really exciting to believe that the small details of current events are reflected in the Bible but that inevitably leads to idiosyncratic and bogus interpretations that nobody can agree on within Armstrongist organizations. It is like seeing figures in the clouds.
I agree that Biblical prophecy has been fulfilled historically. But the kind of odd-ball stuff your hear in the Armstrongists churches is about stirring up the base to raise money. It is also a good brainwashing technique. That fact that it is actually successful as a brain washing technique sometimes emerges in some of the off-the-wall statements contributed to this blog by Armstrongists.
vs 21 "And in his estate shall stand up a vile person, to whom they shall not give the honour of the kingdom: but he shall come in peaceably, and obtain the kingdom by flatteries."
vs 23 "And after the league made with him he shall work deceitfully: for he shall come up, and shall become strong with a small people."
vs 36 "And the king shall do according to his will; and he shall exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak marvellous things against the God of gods, and shall prosper till the indignation be accomplished: for that that is determined shall be done."
vs 37 "Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers, nor the desire of women, nor regard any god: for he shall magnify himself above all."
vs 38 "But in his estate shall he honour the God of forces: and a god whom his fathers knew not shall he honour with gold, and silver, and with precious stones, and pleasant things."
vs 44 "But tidings out of the east and out of the north shall trouble him: therefore he shall go forth with great fury to destroy, and utterly to make away many."
yeah one has to have mastered the art of cherry picking in order to get so many Scriptures in Prophecy that describe donald drumpf...
frankly even if God had explicitly named donald drumpf by name none of you would believe (because of ur predisposition), but frankly in a way He has explicitly named him...
clearly the descriptions above are the spiritual signature of donald drumpf; indeed a very particular demon inhabits the man...
What will happen when Ron's prediction doesn't happen? Oh, just the same thing that happened when HWA, RCM, multiple PT writers, Bang Ik-ha, Iben Browning, Henry of itstimecog fame, Harold Camping, the 2012 freakazoids, the Y2K believers, Heavens Gate, and even Ron himself in the past had a prediction fail. A few devoted adherents will freak out, the larger number will ultimately convince themselves that the speaker didn't say what he said, and the rest of the world will yawn and get back to their business.
Of course, Anon 3:55. It is far easier to cite a randomly remembered phrase against someone than it is to gain a growing understanding of all those writings and their motives, history and common interpretations. Many do not have the will to try. Far, far easier to shout "THE BIIIIIIIBLE (or GAWWWWWWD) says TOP KNOT COME DOWN" or whatever. Nothing wrong at times with saying "I'm not fully sure about that."
Kinda like that annoying aunt we all have who keeps passing along decades-old hoax emails about Muslims not respecting the Australian Pledge of Allegiance (there isnt one), or that Sura 9:11 speaks of a Great Eagle, or that reeeeally skinny men are hiding under your sedan to grab your ankles and rob you.
the hebrew word brit and the fact that the brits dominated the world and also spawned the greatest nation in history convinces me that God kept His Promise to Abraham...
not going to be convinced otherwise by a bunch of childish online posts by people that are of little or no consequence what havent even lived to be 100 yet pretend, yeah, presume to naturally know what happened thousands of years ago...
yeah, mapping; and yet if the things dont happen you scoff and say "why hasnt this" or "why hasnt that" happened...
fact is as a scoffer you simply are predisposed not to believe, so it wouldnt matter if God Himself came to you and Prophesied; the garden of eden situation and the Gospels proved that profoundly...
of course this is all foolishness to one what is carnal minded; and this too is discussed in the Word of God...
It is a great thing that gene science has been added to knowledge. I see 20 year old crimes solved by this technique.
BI proponents do need to come up with sophisticated argument today. I could think of a few but I am more focussed on the truth of impact of stories like the wolf suckling 2 boys leading to the greatest empire.
Or the truth why your scientific reasoning has not immediately settled the palestinian - israeli conflict who by your standards are closer related than my brother and me.
Should this evidence not have closed the deal 10 years ago. Our involvement in the me should include this data. A peace accord should be finalized tomorrow morning on a scientific basis.
Nck, Neo, etc... While not a proponent of BI, some years ago at The Painful Truth I commented that there were ways out for those who still clung to it. One was the tribal composition of the Jewish Diaspora, and the other had to do with tribal assignments when Gentiles were "grafted in" to the nation of Israel. I didn't mind if COGs clutching for straws passed either of these thoughts off as "New Truth", but I recall James pointed out some holes in my suggestions... bye bye BI...
You are facing an insurmountable problem. In order for a theory to have plausibility, it must explain all the facts. While "a nation and company of nations" may be explained by BI, BI does not explain why the British derived people are Gentiles genetically and not Jews. Since this is a scientifically demonstrable fact, you cannot just disregard it.
There are many geopolitical reasons that explain the history of the British people without resorting to passages in the Bible that pertain to Abraham's descendants. There are even Biblically based alternatives. For example, a Jewish Rabbi in Britain suggested to me that USA was actually the Great Babylon, a confluence of peoples, a mart of nations, with great power and great prosperity. He cited the fact that the early British monks identified the Celtic people as descendants of Gomer (a Gentile) and had migrated to the British Isles from north of the Black Sea where they were known as Cimmerians (a name derived from Gomer; Herman Hoeh, who loved connecting similar sounding names without foundation, cast this aside without plausible explanation). In one of the OT prophecies Gomer is identified as one of the powers to stand against the Jewish people and the Messiah at his coming.
I think what I have related above is fanciful and his no merit. But it explains the facts better than BI.
Some observations:
1. You cannot develop a theory that explains a few facts but ignores other important facts and expect to have anyone believe you.
2. Science is not "childish".
3. There is a Hebrew word related to brit and it has nothing to do with the origin of the word British. This is just a Hermanism (as in Hoeh). Look in Wikipedia.
4. Gratuitous and Ad Hominem attacks do not convert your fallacies into truth. You have to bring it.
I believe that belief in BI is a litmus test for having been brain-washed. I believe that people who are brain-washed on a given topic are unable to follow logical discourse on that topic. Let's see if you can prove me wrong.
Near_Earth_Object You keep doing a strawman argument on my 'academic nonsense' comment. What I said and still say is that God is a prayer answering God. He has miraculously communicated to me that BI is correct. He has done the same to these oppressed, minister abused 'tithe slaves.' Which is why these major splinters are not going away. In my case, God put the image of a vast horde of Americans being herded into slavery. So I believe in a coming nightmare.
Given a choice between believing Near_Earth_Object (or similar) or God, I chose to believe God.
The events you cite are all a function of cause and effect, and random probability, Ben. Science has in many cases harnessed and controlled the randomness. Behavioral Science (and that is a branch of science) can and does predict what certain personality types will do, and develops ways of counteracting or controlling them. Scientists HAVE prevented and do prevent thousands or even millions of deaths. Political scientists do advise world leaders who negotiate trades and treaties, and wars have been averted. My recommendation to you would be that in 2018, you need to broaden your horizons, and stop thinking as if you were living in the ancient times in which so many of these topics and events were mysteries. They are not. They have been analyzed and quantified. Hitler, Pol Pot, and other massively evil leaders have been overwhelmed and defeated by the good people. The same will happen to Kim Jong Un, you'll see!
Science is not the enemy. It does pretty much nullify Armstrongism, but is that really a bad thing? That fact would overwhelm superstition? I think not!
why look at the "company of nations" (commonwealth not withstanding) phrase and totally ignore the phenomena of two most powerful nations ever to exist (as was implied in the Promise), so powerful that they control the purse strings of both china and russia?
why ignore the fact that the jews are a small people that control the communications and finance systems of the world, indeed the hold the mortgage on all industries...
and it is Written that they would do so; it is also Written that upon God Returning the jews to palestine, they would no longer be interfered with by the emphraim...
indeed the brits ruled over palestine long before the general jewish return and were at odds with jews what inhabited palestine during the time leading up to that general return...
Interesting? Hate to say it, but I thought some of the posters were really igging out! Wondered if they were some of Thiel's people. I mean we're all at different stages of development, and I guess everyone's got to start somewhere.
Not if it's done rightl. I certainly don't consider the answered prayer that I receive on a daily basis to be self-hypnosis. If you believe you are getting confirmation of the Armstrong false prophecy mold through your prayers though, that is clearly either self-hypnosis or confirmation bias. That's not even the way in which God answers prayers.
If I pray that $160,000 worth of uninsured equipment that's on several skids and has been lost by the freight company in multiple locations will be found, and it is found actually while I'm praying, that's much different from a warm feeling someone might get when he asks about his Anglo-Saxon buddies being taken into captivity and enslaved. The freight was actually found. Your deal? The jury is still way way out. Why would God not have validated HWA in 1972-75, if HWA were His servant?
People have been praying for Armstrong's tribulation for many decades now. If I had listened to people like you, my own personal holocaust at the hands of Armstrongism would have lasted for many years. If HWA's trib happens now in my lifetime, first, because of my relationship with God, I will be protected, and even if God allows me to suffer certain things, it will be for my growth and edification per Rom. 8:38-39. My faith in God is partly based on the loving and merciful ways in which He handled me through my prodigal times. You can't compare 3-1/2 short years with "the Germans" with 45 additional years of agony in an Armstrong church, plus being held back by the ministers from any personal growth or experience towards Kingdom skills by stupid, arbitrarily authoritarian ministers who aren't even in the game.
Armstrongism is not the truth which they had billed it as. It is a defective product, which if used as intended by it's manufacturer, fails consistently and universally produces bad fruits.
Another point, 5:02. If God answers prayer in the manner that you suggest, then each of the 700 splinters is the one and only "true church". Nobody walks away from "God's True Church" and starts a splinter without lots and lots of your type of prayer! I am certain that each one of these "leaders" feels that God has confirmed their intentions on His behalf through their personal prayers. God just doesn't work that way!
nothing random about the jews returning to palestine as was Promised to them by God (that Promise has been an intrical part of their faith for the longest, just as they believed that the second temple would be built, and it was), and since ww2 was the actuator of that return, clearly it too was not a random event...
nothing random about the brits cessation of vexation of the jews of palestine during that same period of time as was also Prophecied...
nothing random about God also Promising to gather the jews from ethiopia, and indeed the jews did accept them because of the Prophecy...
BB God did not validate 1975 because it was not of God. His 'servant' sinned big time by proclaiming that date when the holy spirit gave him no such instruction. I call Herb Herbert Baalam Armstrong because of the historic parallels between Baalam and Herb. In fact Baalam was better than Herb in that he faithfully passed on Gods words. God had Herb trained in free market advertising, which rests on a rights respecting limited government. Herb treacherously rejected this for neo commie tyranny. God considers him a traitor. The 'arbitrary authoritarianism' is stench in God's nostrils.
On Herbs death, God allowed the splintering to loosen the tyranny. God is a God of freedom, so there's nothing to say that He personally intervened in the establishment of any of these splinters.
I showed apreciation for the SCIENCE part of your research.
Perhaps on another thread you could show some apreciation for my view that the STORY of the migration of peoples from the Midde East is completely substantiated by genetic research on evidence found in 250.000 BC, 5000 BC and 1000 BC sequencing.
I am certainly not into proving BI although there are many ways to substantiate THE MYTHS AND LEGENDS from a genetic viewpoint since ALL science points to Iberian and Middle Eastern roots of the Irish.
I am more into the current understanding that these studies, like the research at Trinity College, seems to pop up at times when it is politically conventient, when millions of middle eastern migrants are/were flooding the EU suddenly studies pop up that this has been the case for over 250.000 years.
MY CASE is that at one time during the dark ages (500 AD and the 1900 hundreds) the same narrative was politically convenient too.
Those are in my opinion the roots of BI and its predecessors like the Irish annals speaking about contacts between the Iberian peninsula and Ireland. And it is interesting that at least Trinity College produced a narrative that for the umptieth time corraborates that story for whatever reason.
Ron Dart once mused that the COG’s were going about the promotion of BI in the wrong way. He suggested that a ‘typological’ approach would be the way to go.
Ge 12:2 And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: Ge 12:3 And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.
Which people today, then, would be displaying the characteristics that would suggest that they are Israel?
Ps 2:8 Ask of me, and I will make the nations your inheritance, the ends of the earth your possession. Eze 17:23 In the mountain of the height of Israel will I plant it: and it shall bring forth boughs, and bear fruit, and be a goodly cedar: and under it shall dwell all fowl of every wing; in the shadow of the branches thereof shall they dwell.
I would suggest that Britain in the Nineteenth Century and America in the Twentieth Century, warts and all, have been the modern Cosmic Trees that have been, overall, a blessing to the nations.
If you believe in the Millennium/Messianic Age, beginning just after Jacob’s trouble, which peoples today would be the leading candidate that Christ would use to rule the world for him exercising judgment and justice and be a blessing to the nations?
My candidate, out of all the peoples in the world today, that Christ would use, would be the Anglo-Saxon-Celtic and Related Peoples. Any other candidates?
If Britain and America are not genetic Israel I would suggest that they are typological Israel.
“Virtually all the ideas, knowledge, techniques and institutions around which the world revolves came from the European theatre and its ocean offshoots; many of them explicitly from England, which was the principle matrix of modern society… The sober and unpopular truth is that whatever hope there is for mankind – at least for the foreseeable future – lies in the ingenuity and the civilised standards of the West, above all in those western elements permeated by English ideas and traditions… When we are taught by the Russians and the Chinese how to improve the human condition, when the Japanese give us science, and the Africans great literature, when the Arabs show us the road to prosperity and the Latin Americans to freedom, then will be the time to change the axis of our history” (Paul Johnson, “The Offshore Islanders,” (1984), pp.9-10).
Note 1. Levi, Judah, Benjamin, Ruben and Simeon will have higher social status in the Messianic Age than Ephraim and Manasseh. Dan having the lowest social status of them all.
Note 2: “the mountain of the height of Israel” is Zion; cp, Ez 20:40.
I think that so many people like and need to think that they didn't waste their years in Armstrongism, that there was somehow something worthwhile, something worth saving and that it all related to God. Well, there wasn't, and it didn't. Sometimes some things are just a scam. You wouldn't believe the things that I was supposed to do according to some peoples' visions and validations, and I know from the stories of others that they were told some of the same things, and that mysteriously, somehow it coincidentally all tied into Armstrongism. Where do you think people like Dave Pack came from?
It was a crock. I even had to learn all my ethics in the way other humans should be considered and treated after I left Armstrongism. Honestly, I was one of the lucky ones, because I was only involved with it for about twenty years. I got to actually have a life and an awesome career, to learn a lot of things, and to actually experience God's love in a way that I might not have appreciated if I had not been raised in a toxic and abusive cult. In the remote chance that all this crap they taught that bears no resemblance to the character and sense of justice of God turns out to be right, then with about 5 minutes of pain that we won't even have the capacity to remember, those of us who fancy something better have the opportunity to opt out. But, as I've stated before, it's not going to come to that. Something much better awaits us. Just wish the current victims could somehow understand that.
Don't know if your are still looking at this - it is about five of six posts behind now. I read the articles that you referred to. These are newspaper articles so it is difficult to sift through the data.
The bare essentials are: scientists examined the autosomal DNA from a skeleton of a woman from Ireland dating from around 5,000 BP. Her genome indicates she is related genetically to people from Spain or Sardinia. These Mediterranean people are thought to have brought agriculture to Ireland. Agriculture came from the middle east, hence, to connection to the middle east. Unfortunately, the newspaper couch this to sound like the woman and her tribe migrated directly from the middle east to Ireland.
These early Mediterraneans were absorbed by later waves of Celtic/Anglo-Saxon migration from Eastern Europe. The agricultural connection is based on Diffusionist Theory. I think this is weak. The Mediterraneans could easily have discovered agriculture independently.
The bottom line is that this in no way supports the idea that the modern day Irish have their genetic origin in the Middle East or that the modern day Irish are connected to Jews.
12.09 AM Ron Dart 'jumped ship' before Herb died. Had he left after Herbs death, fine, but to have left beforehand to do his own thing was a act of desertion. So I wouldn't quote Ron to gain credibility for some point.
Yes, am still reading. Although both of us do not seem to have enough stake in it all to dig to the primary source but stick to the newspaper article.
-I do know that people are not born from stones or springs. So they had to come from somewhere -It is possible/highly likely that modern day irish have no middle eastern origin or that they are related to a people from there -Most of BI theory centers around the elites. We do know that elites from time immemorial have intermingled with kings and princes from very far away. -My only point in in all of this is that if someone makes a promise to a certain group or people in a specific time frame. And this promise is going to be fulfilled on a latter date after they moved from locality. It should be possible to discern from genetics where the two match. a) from bones in the original place of promise and b) from modern research.
As I recall 70% of Irish moved to the USA or elsewhere mid 19th century. So perhaps people should look in those places.
What I do know about "Celts" and "Germans" is that from history it is hard to discern when they are denoted as "migrant tribes" or called that way after they settled and mingled like "a people." Most of those tribes had different names for themselves than what they were called by the Romans for political of geographical reasons. Much like "an American" did not exist pre 1600's.
At least BI proponents need to discuss the matter including modern scientific understanding and the bar has been raised.
On ocassion I watch tv programs where two "sisters" do a gene test to see if there father was really their father because of famiy rumors. On ocassion it turns out that they really do not share the same father. Of course they emphasize that they will remain sisters always on camera. But still, it seems that science took something away from them.
This brings us to what we can prove. The impact on politics has been unmistaken. Science will not explain that.
It is like a group of scientists coming together in 90 years calculating and explaining that "Trumps Wall" from economic and construction perspective never could have been a feasible project. Most scientists would agree on that today even.
It takes historians and political scientists to explain 100 milion people having a go at the idea of a wall. (which from a scientific viewpoint will turn into tighter controls)
But hey, I do not rule out that some BI proponent comes up with a solution to the genetic coding. I can come up with a couple solutions to circumvent it. But it seems the theory served its purpose in its due time. Just like "the idea" of the wall, served its political purpose in its time.
nck, it's much more feasible that Abraham's seed was Jesus Christ, and that therefore Christians are modern Israel, and it has nothing to do with genetics. Paul says as much, but he uses the most prominent group that the other tribes were assimilated by, the Jews. That didn't appeal to HWA because he labelled Sunday-keeping Christians as falsely so-called. Christians are not monochromatic. Every ethnic group known to man has its Christians, and the US and Europe have historically been the beacons that disseminated the results of the Protestant Reformation around the world. It also makes sense that if Christians anywhere lost or forgot their values, correction would be imminent.
"on ocassion I watch tv programs where two "sisters" do a gene test to see if there father was really their father because of famiy rumors."
Funny you mention that, nck. I actually just submitted a DNA test for a similar reason (a gap in the family history that I'd like to be filled regarding a missing grandparent).
January 2, 2018 at 7:15 AM Yes, that is entirely feasible. Although you seem to label catholics like hwa labelled "christians so called".
I think you are quoting wcg doctrine. As wcg taught miracles happened to have the spanish armada blown away so protestantism could flourish. The difference is that wcg required genetic and physical foreshadowings of spiritual truths. As a matter of fact. In the infamous 5 million "bestseller" it is said that God would be a liar if he would not stay true to the physical fulfillment of his promises.
RSK. (whatever happens I will be your "virtual bro from cyberspace") ALL emperors were adopted as Jesus quoted Roman Law, therefore we call him abba father in the spirit of adoption, which was a roman custom and legal status"
“So I wouldn't quote Ron to gain credibility for some point.”
I did not quote Ron to gain credibility but to acknowledge him for making, what I consider, a valuable point. I credit, or at least try to, all my sources that I utilise. I don’t think HWA was a shining light in this regard.
I suggest that it would have been better to engage the validity of the post, not resorting to a put down. You only lose credibility resorting to the latter.
By the way do you think HWA came up with the understanding, wrong by the way, that Elohim is “a uni-plural noun”?
“ Elohim (sometimes "El" or "Elah"), English form "God," the first of the three primary names of Deity, is a uni-plural noun…” (Cyrus Ingerson Scofield, Scofield Reference Notes, 1917).
“And so it was that in the fall of 1926 [aged 34] … that I entered into an in-depth study of the Bible for the first time in my life” (Herbert W. Armstrong, Autobiography of Herbert W. Armstrong, Vol.1, p.291).
Examples of Elohim:
Ex 4:14b Is not Aaron the Levite thy brother? Ex 4:15a And thou shalt speak unto him, and put words in his mouth: Ex 4:16 And he shall be thy spokesman unto the people: and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God [Elohim] to him (AV & NIV).
Ex 6:29 That the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, I am the LORD: speak thou unto Pharaoh king of Egypt all that I say unto thee Ex 7:1 And the LORD said unto Moses, See, I have made thee a god [Elohim] to Pharaoh: and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet.
1 Ki 11:33 Ashtoreth the goddess [elohim] of the Zidonians, Chemosh the god [elohim] of the Moabites, and Milcom the god [elohim] of the children of Ammon.
"Ron Dart 'jumped ship' before Herb died. Had he left after Herbs death, fine, but to have left beforehand to do his own thing was a act of desertion. So I wouldn't quote Ron to gain credibility for some point."
Ron Dart was suspended from speaking in WCG and told to sit and do nothing. The political situation was bleak, as Stan Rader was in charge, and was purging anyone who might be a threat to his desire to succeed HWA, whose death seemed imminent. Plus, Dart was uncomfortable receiving people's hard-earned tithe money for doing nothing. Also, Dart stated that he was a minister for Jesus Christ, and if WCG didn't want him to do that, he would have to go elsewhere. So, he did. Rather than costing him credibility, those actions make him very credible.
I understand where the Dart comment is comming from. I corresponded with him a little in the eighties. But it didnt feel comfortable in the sense that he was in a satellite as the mothership was going strong.
I don t know exactly when he went with gta but rader was baptized at a very late stage. It s hard to believe rader coveted any spiritual office very much. Even less an apostleship so called.
79 comments:
The reason why the latter day Armstrongist prophets score zero in prediction is because of a simple fact. HWA said the key to Biblical prophecy was the identity of Israel. He founded his personal prophetic infrastructure on this identity.
Genetics has kicked the legs out from under this "key". Hence, there is no way for these "prophets" to be anything but wrong.
I hate to harp on this but I wrote the following in response to an earlier post on this blog:
The key to prophecy, according to HWA, was the identity of the modern day Tribes of Israel. An ancillary, but necessary, identity involves Germany as the Assyrians. This prophetic infrastructure has decisively imploded. And anyone who continues to subscribe to this patent medicine sideshow should join the flat earth society.
I will not go into the genetics. I have gotten some push back from this website on the complexities of genetics for this venue. (One BI supporter described genetics as "trivia" and the real proof was the "nation and company of nations" concept. You will notice that BI supporters evince their brain-washed state by not being able to follow logical discourse on this topic.) So let me summarize the conclusion that genetics, a hard and established biological science, gives us:
In spite of coincidental geopolitical events, parallels in history, similarities in the pronunciation of place names, writings by crackpots, arcane allusions in pseudo-history, beliefs that identities have been mysteriously hidden, The Compendium of World History, Herman Hoehs Ph.D from Ambassador College and my-uncle-is-Irish-but-he-looks-just-like-a-Jew, genetics demonstrates incontrovertibly that the Celtic and Anglo-Saxon people of the British Isles are not descended from Israel (and the Germans are not descended from Asshur).
And I can hear it now: "God hid their identify even from scientists." That is rank denial of the most pathetic sort. One should instead consider what God says about those who claim to be Jews and are not. (I know, someone told a big lie at one time that Israel and the Jews are two separate people, hence, the non-sensical statement: "we are not claiming to be Jews but rather Israelites." But a political separation does not create a genetic separation among people with the same origin (descent from Abraham). Don't be dumb for the sake of preserving an absurdity.)
If the key of prophecy is false, HWA's prophetic infrastructure collapses. And this is really not something difficult, mysterious, dark and arcane to understand. What is difficult, mysterious, dark and arcane is the bizarre idea that Celts and Anglo-Saxons, with totally different genetics and migrational histories, could be within the racial pale of Judaism. Any minister basing prophecy on this invalid "key" will inevitably be demonstrated to be false and I feel sorry for his duped followers.
Armstrong legacy was built on tithe slavery! Anything they say amounts to nothing! I am a happy member of the Pentecostal Free-Will Baptist Church and I approve my message!
4.13 PM
There is no need to feel sorry for your 'duped followers' because they are not duped. Do you seriously think church members have endured the financial sacrifice and daily mental strain of praying for the work without God intervening to confirm their efforts. Which is why the reasoning and the 'proofs' of Near_Earth_Object and Dennis the spiritual menace is academic nonsense to such Christians.
Oddly enough, I heard last week that Weinland had been afflicted with a really severe headache that wouldn't go away. I understand that he finally had to be MEDEVAC'd to his proctologist.
BB
That's not confirmation, 5:51, it's self-hypnosis. Honestly, even if HWA had been on the up and up, and had had the keys to unlock prophecy, Ron Weinland would still be a false prophet, and a charlatan. He set dates, and they failed. He did wrong, and was jailed. He's old, his ship has sailed. He's finished, his people have bailed. And that should tell the tale!
Neo
Its ok to harp on what BI is not.
In my opinion hwa nailed it better than any christian since.
A) you know that the body of scientific proof for christian philosophy is as non existent as bi.
B) bi is founded in reality while christianity is not.
BI in its latest form served to forge a new identity for the elite ruling this world. The 19th century british and french empires were financed by a race deemed cursed an longed for acceptance. With haut finance and benjamin disraeli ruling the largest empire ever there was a flicker of hope.
In my christmas posting I labored to write that in the 1930's a new identity was forged in the coming empire of the USA. People like Irving Beilin forged a secular (dechristianized) christmas as the identity of the american empire was forged through at least 25 songs like white christmas that when you disect the lyrics non of them speaks about jesus.
White christmas, gi's abroad serving the empire and secular jewish songs are intrinsically linked.
I am harping on these cultural mixing of identity since wall street and political power of a people until the 1930's considered in america as non whites with limited immigration quota are known facts.
Oh I forgot to mention the 19th century intermarriagw of jewish and american heiresses into impoverished british elite society.
Later of course protestant britain needed the ideology to support a jewish homeland.
I could go on and on but HWA's writings have more of a chance to come true or at least be on par with historical development in a secular way than any human ever dwell on a cloud in heaven in some philosophical construct.
So yes NEO. Your harping might be scientifically closer to truth although you have never come up with genetic research on 1000 bc bones from israel.
It seems the assumption is that the current inhabitants are genetic descendants of the buried bones.
But even if so.
My description of 19th century british empire and its american successor is accurate and the jews would certainly not oppose an ideology that linked them to the rulers and ruling class and newly forged american culture in a way that would describe them as cousins instead of gettoed vermin (which had been the case for over 2000 years).
I am pretty sure my regular case about protestant identity forge with the identity of the people of israel exiting from the pharaonic / habsburg empire was another powerful piece of propaganda or rather ideology to serve the infamous break up of the catholic european empire and renew in something more dynamic and viable than the middle ages.
Nck
As I mentioned before, it was the official doctrine of the two million strong Anglican church during the 1800s that the British empire was Gods fulfillment of His promise to Abraham of a 'nation and company of nations.' The British empire is the largest in human history, yet this and the following American empire is just shrugged off. How honest or objective is that?
While it is difficult to argue a case for BI, it is not helped by the misuse of Scripture in arguing that the throne of Britain is the throne of David. Having said that it doesn’t mean that QEII is not a descendant of David, typology of the Davidic and Stewart Kings suggest this – QEII is a descendant of James Stewart the first King of the Union of the Crowns of Scotland, England and Ireland – Stewart blood runs through the succeeding monarchs, though there were dynastic changes.
It is a misunderstanding in that there are two thrones in Israel and that both have to be occupied to establish the throne of David – the throne of David and the Temple are Jerusalem fixtures. The temple throne was not ‘occupied’ in the Second-Temple period hence no throne of David. This relationship between the Davidic kings and the Temple was established when Solomon built the temple – Davidic royalty are Temple builders and Temple cult patrons.
Ge 17:13 He that is born in thy house, and he that is bought with thy money, must needs be circumcised: and my covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant.
Ge 17:14 And the uncircumcised man child whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he hath broken my covenant.
It is a misunderstanding in that an everlasting covenant can be broken, not by God but by people.
1Ki 2:4 That the LORD may continue his word which he spake concerning me [David], saying, If thy children take heed to their way, to walk before me in truth with all their heart and with all their soul, there shall not fail thee (said he) a man on the throne of Israel.
1 Ki 8:25 Therefore O LORD God of Israel, keep for your servant my father David that which you have promised him, saying, ‘There shall never fail you a successor before me to sit on the throne of Israel, if only your children look to their way, to walk before me as you have walked before me’ (NRSV).
There was an “if” clause to the everlasting covenant with the Davidic kings. Both David and Solomon understood this. There is no free pass with God.
Jer 33:14 Behold, the days come, saith the LORD.
Jer 33:15 In those days, and at that time
Jer 33:17 For thus saith the LORD; David shall never want a man to sit upon the throne of the house of Israel;
Jer 33:18 Neither shall the priests the Levites want a man before me to offer burnt offerings, and to kindle meat offerings, and to do sacrifice continually.
Jesus Christ departed Solomon’s Temple (Eze 8-11) and then the human Davidic kings were ‘expelled’ from throne of David until the fulfilment of the Millennial promise of God to Israel through Jeremiah.
Jer 52:31 And it came to pass in the seven and thirtieth year of the captivity of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the twelfth month, in the five and twentieth day of the month, that Evil-merodach king of Babylon in the first year of his reign lifted up the head of Jehoiachin king of Judah, and brought him forth out of prison,
“David shall never want a man” “in those days” implies that David would want for a man to occupy the throne of David since the time of Zedekiah, though Jehoiachin, noted twice in verse 31 as “king of Judah” was of the legitimate line; just as the Levitical priests would want for a man to offer sacrifices during the Babylonian exile and after AD70.
Eze 17:22 ... I will crop off from the top of his young twigs a tender [rak] one, and will plant it upon an high mountain and eminent:
Isa 11:1 And there shall come forth a rod [choter] out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch [“netser”] shall grow out of his roots:
Isa 53:2 For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant [yoneq], and as a root out of a dry ground...
Jer 23:5 ... I will raise unto David a righteous Branch [tsemach], and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth.
The ‘tender twig’ is Ezekiel’s contribution to the ‘horticultural’ expressions used to designate the Messiah.
"As I mentioned before, it was the official doctrine of the two million strong Anglican church during the 1800s that the British empire was Gods fulfillment of His promise to Abraham of a 'nation and company of nations.' The British empire is the largest in human history, yet this and the following American empire is just shrugged off. How honest or objective is that?"
3:43
It becomes problematic when you would use "ideology" of the elites of said empires as "genetic proof. Neo should present evidence that people known as the jews are genetically the same as thousand bc bones from palestine, not its current inhabitants.
If he has that genetic evidence that it becomes more difficult to argue the wandering of those peoples to the british isles.
My point is that it really does not matter.
The Roman Empire was born on the myth of a wolf suckling two boys.
Why cannot the greatest empires ever be based on a myth that its financiers and elites are cousins to a blessed race holding the oracles of God?
It was a rather modest thought of those protestant british to attribute their wealth to the blessings of God instead of their own doings. And it was even more kind of the Americans to accept jews as their cousins at a time when not a single christian person saw any merit in the "murderers of christ". HWA propagated this very kind andn enlightened myth, which no jew would ever deny although they would rather wrap it in diplomatic terms like "special relationship" to the people of the USA.
nck
Church of God prognosticators get lost in the moment of their prognostications and then comes the future. You can only reset and restart so often convincing the oblivious that God is giving "us" more time. No one ever says, "I apologize. I know I told you to pull big triggers. I was badly mistaken. Refunds are in the mail ".
I will repeat myself yet again. People who believe in BI, because they have been brain-washed, cannot follow logical discourse on this topic.
For example:
1. Enduring "the financial sacrifice and daily mental strain of praying for the work" does not somehow convert objective, scientifically established truth into "academic nonsense".
2. I have not produced genetic research on bones from Israelites from 1000 BC. No doubt this kind of genetic analysis could be done but it superfluous. Christ, a descendant of David who lived in 1000 BC, came to his own. Note he did not come to the British Isles. He came to the Jews of Palestine who have historical, migrational and religious continuity with modern Jews. The implication is that if we were to dig up some bones from Israel at the level of 1000 BC, we would find them to indicate haplogroup R1b (British) instead of haplogroup J (Jewish). This would make modern Jews really Gentiles. And now you are joining up with the odd Anti-Semites who used to haunt the Big Sandy campus.
What supporters of BI now need to do is to demonstrate that the science of genetics, a biological reality from the hands of the Creator, is false. Nothing less will do because it is genetics that wholly invalidates BI. And the BI advocates must use the Scientific Method and not a package of pseudo-history, accumulated anecdote and illogic to accomplish this. Lots of luck!
Dennis
"Fundamentalists" of any religion or philosophy claim direct results if people would just hearken back to "the perceived original philosophy."
This is impossible since all are changed and influenced through the current circumstances.
If those circumstances do not satisfy through war (civil), rumors of war (cold war) callers for imminent change always surface.
No refunds. We are living in Utopia are we not. I would not compare modern oregonians with the wretched settlers dying on the oregon trail raided by natives and charged by robber cattle barons. 3 tithes are a blessing compared to the lives of our ancestors. Although a tax break can be fun at times.
Nck
The biggest proof, one way or another, of the veracity of HWA and those fighting amongst themselves for his mantle, is whether or not the things he said would happen have happened, and within the timeline on which he said they would happen. We can argue forever over the supports or proofs he offered, but the rubber meets the road and gains traction only if what he said comes to pass.
I didn't give him a second chance when 1975 failed. I was there, those of us in my age group who grew up in the church fully expected to live only into our twenties, because that's what the entire church had been taught and believed. When 1972 came, with no sign of the Germans, and no tribulation or Petra, the spin doctors went to work convincing and reprogramming members that we had not been taught what we were taught, that no dates had been set, and that the church was now entering a new phase of the work because we had been given more time to finish the work. Large numbers accepted the reprogramming, even as we see happening today when the prognostications of such people as David Pack and Ronald Weinland consistently fail. And, remember: everyone knew of HWA and GTA. Their message, correct or incorrect, was going out with a power that all of the ACOGs combined cannot even approximate today.
I've said for years that all of the deadlines that this church movement has attempted to impose have been blown. The last possible one involves the symbolism of the tender twig in Jesus' Olivet Discourse representing the rebirth of Israel as a nation. Baby boomers born in 1948 are going to be turning 70 in 2018. The Bible indicates that man's post-flood lifespan is 70 years. How do you reckon the passing of a generation? WCG used to use much shorter spans of time in their interpretation, modifying it along the way to fit their prophecy mold as time eliminated their earlier interpretations. Now, we're at the outer reaches, the last possible redefining, and still no Germans, no tribulation, and no end!
The WW-I and WW-II generation ministers have largely passed. Are the ACOGs now looking at baby boomer generation ministers like Jerry Weston and Dave Pack, and counting on the end coming before they die? At one time, we all expected HWA to lead us into Petra, and to present us to Jesus Christ as He descended to split the Mount of Olives.
Armstrongism as we know it is now in its last possible viable years. Over the past twenty years, we've been watching unconscionable fleecing of miniaturized flocks, grand titles being taken, mini-Herb construction projects, failed dates, and zero effectiveness in getting any sort of message out. You could argue that Evangelicals have been more effective in popularizing the end times than the Armstrong organization ever was. The best hope of the Armstrong movement, best collection of talent, and most demonstrable growth seemed to be centered around Ian Boyne. And, now Ian has passed.
I don't believe that a movement which has racked up so many very public failures can suddenly become like the broken clock, and reach the point at which it is right. That is a false metaphor. The Armstrong movement has proven itself to be more like a completely unreliable watch that runs either fast or slow, and is therefore an inaccurate witness to any timelines which God might have in mind.
BB
I am writing a book which is a collection of comments from this site. There are more lies in that book than in Ron's sermons.
BB is extrenely convincing.
NEO is also convincing. Although he should be the first to admit that from a scientific viewpoint his argument about me teaming up is extremely poor.
You should admit that my question on 1000 bc bones is to the point and legitimate. Although I will admit to be in questionable company raising the question.
Nck
BB
What you religiously insist on is to not individuate Herb and the bible. The two are not one and the same. 1975 was Herb trying to manipulate God to prematurely bring down the curtain on human history in order to hide the failure of Communism at that time. Scratch the surface, and you will find that his church then, and the splinters today are still commie at their core.
1975 is nowhere found in the bible. I will give $10,000 to anyone who can show me this. The prophesys regarding WW3 and the second coming are there for all to read in the bible.
You have thrown out the baby with the bathwater.
I do watch TV televangelists, and the odd Evangelist does teach that the ten toes are the United States of Europe, but I have not come across one who mentions the tribulation coming to America. In fact Kenneth Copeland insists it will only happen over seas. So no, other denominations are not warning the Anglo Saxons of military defeat and enslavement.
Have a heart! These latter day prophets are just trying to make a buck. And the brinkmanship required is dizzying. First, they must stir up their gullible base by flaunting all the horrors of the future that the base will personally escape if they are generous with their wallets.
Than, when it all fails, they must come up with a creative solution that will explain why the failed prophecy but avoid making them look like patent medicine show salesmen. And their base might lose its gullibility and abandon them at anytime or be drawn away to another false predictor.
And then these latter day prophets have to finally die and face God.
It's a hard life for them.
Asked and answered over and over again, 10:11 but somehow you never let it register. Reread my past responses to you on the issues that you have once again raised. Even I become tired of repeating myself!
Per your final paragraph, so far as non-Armstrong evangelists go, while nobody has complete truth, I believe they frequently know things HWA never did, have a deeper understanding, and a more spiritually-developed approach.
Anybody who believes that God has confirmed the capture and subjugation of white Anglo-Saxon nations in a tribulation is simply practicing prayer self-hypnosis. God answers prayers, in fact my cell phone rang this morning during my prayers with an answer to something I had just been requesting from Father God. The thing is, God knows how easily we can be deceived by confirmation bias, and does not answer our prayers in the manner you suggest. If He did, the "confirmation" of my life's mission through a relative's prayer would have kicked in during the 1970s. So, this was a lesson I learned early on. My primary gift over decades has been with machines, and not with church leadership.
BB
Testing of 1,000 BC bones could very much happen in the future, nck.
I'd be more interested in dna testing of the bones of Israelites during Moses' time, during Babylonian captivity, during the intertestamental era of the Hasmonean Kings, and during Jesus' time on Earth, but 1,000 years BC is a good start.
BB
NEO
Repeating my earlier statement.
I am shocked to see that a person continuously quoting scientific evidence resorts to extremely poor logic when confronted by a question to provide real proof.
How could you resort to the argument that someone among questionable ilk is not able to ask a legitimate question and worse, how the hell did you resort to quoting the bible to proof a scientific point. That is diminishing your strong argument to scientific crockery. What a shame. Since I love you to bitch regard me as iron sharpening iron and exposing your extremely flawed reasoning. No one said genetic science is untrue. I was just asking if there are links to 1000 bc palestinian bones and the brits. You are aware that among british (unscientific) lore it is said that Jesus walked the blessed hills of england as party to his uncle's Arimethea trade mission.
And I am quoting the unofficial (and unscientific) national anthem of England here. (Not the British anthem). This ideology is sooooooo much bigger than a limited study on genetics.
"And did those feet in ancient time: Walk upon England's mountains green?"
nck
Anon 10:11 said
"I do watch TV televangelists, and the odd Evangelist does teach that the ten toes are the United States of Europe"
I'm no evangelist but I can tell you that the "ten toes" are the ten zones that the Club of Rome has conveniently divided the planet into.... Google that.
Adolf my friend, the ten toes are the ten vassal states of the u.s.a., the head of the beast.
1.05 PM
They are called the ten TOES for a reason ie, they are are attached to the legs which were the left and right wing of the Roman empire.
BB
I sounds like in 1975 you worshiped the church rather than God. Or you worshiped nothing.
HIs followers will not care if he is wrong. These people are brainwashed and in need of a leader to tell them what to do. They really do not think for themselves or look into things without being told how to look, where to look and what to see when they do look.
The book of revelation was not going to be included in the canon of the Bible because they realized it was all metaphor and fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem and the generation on whom all those things would come as Christ said.
NCK:
I would like to give you an appropriate response to your post but I can only understand a small fraction of what you write (now and in the past). Apparently, English is not your first language. If you could re-write what you have written and have a native English speaker then correct it, I think I could respond. But otherwise, I don't want to expend effort on answering something of uncertain meaning.
One issue was clear enough to respond to - why do I quote the Bible to prove a scientific point. I do not believe the Bible and science are mutually exclusive in principle. I do believe the Bible is an incarnational document and has suffered in the hands of human editors. I believe there was a Jesus and that he was a Jew and the Jews, both ancient and modern, are haplogroup J. If you want to take exception to the genetics, you will be swimming against the tide of reputable scientists and historians.
BB
If a "davidic" kingship is under discussion. Why would one expressly skip the 1000 bc bones?
Anyway. You' re right there must be some Mosaic slave massgraves in the Egyptian dessert. And bi lore has it that one part split to ireland before the captivity.
Iron age farmers from Ireland are confirmed middle eastern as i ve posted the article many times.
But they do not fit the bi time frame.
One of the reasons I maintain often that HWA was right on everything although in a secular and twisted way and different time frame.
Nck
i think it comical that people keep talking about science even though prophecy is being fulfilled...
the jews do dominate their enemies, the arabs have become a great people, God did gather the jews from ethiopia and other places as he Promised and made them to return to the land of israel, jerusalem is a burdensome stone to all what involve themselves with it...
Daniel 11:21 describes donald drumpf to a t; Daniel 11:20 describes obama and how his accomplishments have virtually come to nothing...
soon Christ will actually Return, and all you end time scoffers (yeah, u people were prophesied about too) will simply be dead, not entering into His Rest...
i think the more appropriate question would be what if what he says does come to past cuz nothing so far has, right?
There was a doctrine with no proof and B... I .... N, G, O was its name - o
British Israel Not God Ordained
British Israel Not God Ordained
British Israel Not God Ordained
and B... I .... N, G, O was its name - o
"God did gather the jews from ethiopia and other places as he Promised and made them to return to the land of israel, "
Where does it say that? Any why is Israel kicking all the ethiopian jews out of the country?
2:27 ~ You wouldn't understand. 1975 was going to serve as the final and ultimate validation to all of us as to whether HWA/WCG was of God. They said that having and observing the correct doctrines (especially the sabbath) meant that they alone were God's little elect group of people, and therefore qualified as being the humans to whom God would reveal the meanings of the endtime prophecies, and the time table. Well, He didn't. So, when their understanding of prophecy proved to be false, it automatically meant that they also did not have the correct doctrines. False teachers can't have anything but false prophecies, and vice versa. The two simply cannot be separated. This is why so many people today either want to revise and deny that HWA ever set dates, or they insist that the prophecies were not false, but just delayed. They blind themselves to the very obvious answer which is that God never had anything to do with HWA.
Deut. 18:22 means that HWA/WCG did not have the witness of God supporting them. As we learned some years later, most likely God allowed Satan to confuse HWA because of HWA's incest with his daughter. So, there were no restored truths, and all ministers who base their teachings on those of HWA are both false teachers, and false prophets. None of their excuses or explanations matter.
So far as God goes, I've got a much healthier and more authentic relationship with Him today than was ever possible back when I believed that WCG was God's one and only. But, I had to first go through a period of cleansing (years of atheism) and fresh restudy of all the doctrines and issues to get rid of the bogussness and anti-Christian practices that were taught in the toxic cult of Armstrongism. I consider myself to be extremely fortunate, and very blessed.
BB
yeah, u science types: use science to explain the phenom of donald drumpf and how in one fell swoop he has managed to defy all convention and logic and become the most powerful man on earth? i look at all these lengthy comments on this blog, vain white papers, as it were, but theres only one explanation as to how a total jackass could possibly take over this nation, and that is a spiritual one and the fulfillment of prophecy..
and history has shown us that his kind could potentially control the masses and compel them to destroy all you what think urselves as superior thinkers...
i have read on this blog those what have claimed that science is winning over religion: clearly that is not true; invisible forces working within men like donald drumpf have elevated him to cult status, threatening the status quo of the last 75 years, including the prominence of the scientific types...
indeed, as it is Written, one of the few sciences the man respects is the science of warfare, i.e., the gods of force (not to mention the art of manipulating the masses through flattery)...
so, while you science types enjoy the last moments of ur glorious rise in recent decades, reflect on how easily this product of invisible force has suddenly risen, and how scientists have become subject to a madman suddenly in control of the purse strings that yeild the funds you rely upon to do ur research and make ur living...
Nck, I proved from scriptures in one of my papers which still exists over in the archives the Painful Truth website that the conditional promise (based on the obedience of his descendents) to David that the throne would never want for one of his heirs was nullified precisely because of the gross continued lack of obedience. No human sits on that throne today. You could argue that Jesus Christ, following His life and death for mankind, sits on it, but the Germans in England's royal family certainly do not.
BB
7:24 ~ Or not.
BB
Hello NEO.
I deliberately write the way I do to not fuel Armstrongites.
I know you understand exactly what I am saying since you deliberately ignore my main point.
You summarized it well though by stating that you "believe" jews both ancient and modern represent J.
My deliberate obfuscation focussed on scientific proof of that belief.
So far I have seen no genetic research on 1000 bc palestinian bones. Whereas Irish research proved middle eastern farmers in dublin.
Although of course the Irish research does not fit the bi time frame in any way.
Nck
https://www.thenational.ae/world/pre-historic-migration-from-middle-east-brought-farming-to-ireland-1.100990
Nck
9.26 PM
I think your comment belongs on a different blog, but from a Christian perspective, Trump was voted into office because of the negative consequences of Obama's sinful polices.
In my experience most of the ACOG cults and even atheists cheery pick the bible.
3.55 AM
Amen.
"It's tough making predictions, especially about the future." - Yogi Berra
It's more difficult for COGs to make predictions because they have an erroneous understanding of the past.
A summary response to a bunch of the above posts:
NCK, as regards ancient DNA, you can have a look at: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/a16b/033eb96877f84622193adc9e6020b69dd818.pdf
NCK, I had a look at the paper you cite indicating that people from the Middle East brought agriculture to Ireland. The article did not cite their haplogroup but they are apparently now extinct because there are only trace signals of Middle Eastern ancestry in the British Isles. In the British Isles, there is a small amount of E1b which is actually from North Africa in an ocean, otherwise, of R1b and some other western European haplogroups. This same E1b haplogroup occus in many European countries. If you are asserting that the Irish have a Middle Eastern origin based on this article, your assertion fails.
Let me add that when I state the Jews are haplogroup J, I am not saying that this is the one and only haplogroup their population reflects. Intermarriage and assimilation have occurred - especially in more modern times when movements of populations have been facilitated by better transportation. In general, large political units encompass many haplogroups within their boundaries. Germany, for instance, claimed racial purity but in fact they are a composite of many haplogroups. Hitler himself, based on his still living relatives, was haplogroup E1b out of North Africa. Jews are haplogroup J due to numerical predominance, migrational patterns, archaeology and history.
The archetype false prophet was Gerald Waterhouse. He was to idiosyncratic prophetic interpretations what Dean Blackwell was to institutional racism. Waterhouse's free-wheeling, three hour romps through "prophecy" are legendary. He was locked into the standard Armstrongist interpretations but he tended to "ornament" these wild ramblings with his own supporting viewpoints. He once stated that Stanley Rader was going to do the legal work to lease the commercial passenger jets to take obedient WCG members to the Place of Safety. I guess that one failed. And I think he also predicted that HWA would not die before the Second Coming. I guess that one failed. But I would think Waterhouse was just as inspired as the modern day Armstrongist prophets.
I think the modern day fountains of false prophecy feel like they have been credentialed by Gerald Waterhouse. He set the pattern and gave them the sense of liberty to say whatever.
Mapping modern day figures such as Obama and Trump into prophetic statements that have long been fulfilled will not lead anyone to enlightenment. It is really exciting to believe that the small details of current events are reflected in the Bible but that inevitably leads to idiosyncratic and bogus interpretations that nobody can agree on within Armstrongist organizations. It is like seeing figures in the clouds.
I agree that Biblical prophecy has been fulfilled historically. But the kind of odd-ball stuff your hear in the Armstrongists churches is about stirring up the base to raise money. It is also a good brainwashing technique. That fact that it is actually successful as a brain washing technique sometimes emerges in some of the off-the-wall statements contributed to this blog by Armstrongists.
cush was one of the places from where God said He would gather the jews...
Daniel 11:
vs 21 "And in his estate shall stand up a vile person, to whom they shall not give the honour of the kingdom: but he shall come in peaceably, and obtain the kingdom by flatteries."
vs 23 "And after the league made with him he shall work deceitfully: for he shall come up, and shall become strong with a small people."
vs 36 "And the king shall do according to his will; and he shall exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak marvellous things against the God of gods, and shall prosper till the indignation be accomplished: for that that is determined shall be done."
vs 37 "Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers, nor the desire of women, nor regard any god: for he shall magnify himself above all."
vs 38 "But in his estate shall he honour the God of forces: and a god whom his fathers knew not shall he honour with gold, and silver, and with precious stones, and pleasant things."
vs 44 "But tidings out of the east and out of the north shall trouble him: therefore he shall go forth with great fury to destroy, and utterly to make away many."
yeah one has to have mastered the art of cherry picking in order to get so many Scriptures in Prophecy that describe donald drumpf...
frankly even if God had explicitly named donald drumpf by name none of you would believe (because of ur predisposition), but frankly in a way He has explicitly named him...
clearly the descriptions above are the spiritual signature of donald drumpf; indeed a very particular demon inhabits the man...
crimson fjord ben jochannon...
What will happen when Ron's prediction doesn't happen? Oh, just the same thing that happened when HWA, RCM, multiple PT writers, Bang Ik-ha, Iben Browning, Henry of itstimecog fame, Harold Camping, the 2012 freakazoids, the Y2K believers, Heavens Gate, and even Ron himself in the past had a prediction fail. A few devoted adherents will freak out, the larger number will ultimately convince themselves that the speaker didn't say what he said, and the rest of the world will yawn and get back to their business.
Of course, Anon 3:55. It is far easier to cite a randomly remembered phrase against someone than it is to gain a growing understanding of all those writings and their motives, history and common interpretations. Many do not have the will to try. Far, far easier to shout "THE BIIIIIIIBLE (or GAWWWWWWD) says TOP KNOT COME DOWN" or whatever.
Nothing wrong at times with saying "I'm not fully sure about that."
Kinda like that annoying aunt we all have who keeps passing along decades-old hoax emails about Muslims not respecting the Australian Pledge of Allegiance (there isnt one), or that Sura 9:11 speaks of a Great Eagle, or that reeeeally skinny men are hiding under your sedan to grab your ankles and rob you.
the hebrew word brit and the fact that the brits dominated the world and also spawned the greatest nation in history convinces me that God kept His Promise to Abraham...
not going to be convinced otherwise by a bunch of childish online posts by people that are of little or no consequence what havent even lived to be 100 yet pretend, yeah, presume to naturally know what happened thousands of years ago...
yeah, mapping; and yet if the things dont happen you scoff and say "why hasnt this" or "why hasnt that" happened...
fact is as a scoffer you simply are predisposed not to believe, so it wouldnt matter if God Himself came to you and Prophesied; the garden of eden situation and the Gospels proved that profoundly...
of course this is all foolishness to one what is carnal minded; and this too is discussed in the Word of God...
NEO
It is a great thing that gene science has been added to knowledge. I see 20 year old crimes solved by this technique.
BI proponents do need to come up with sophisticated argument today. I could think of a few but I am more focussed on the truth of impact of stories like the wolf suckling 2 boys leading to the greatest empire.
Or the truth why your scientific reasoning has not immediately settled the palestinian - israeli conflict who by your standards are closer related than my brother and me.
Should this evidence not have closed the deal 10 years ago. Our involvement in the me should include this data. A peace accord should be finalized tomorrow morning on a scientific basis.
Nck
Nck, Neo, etc...
While not a proponent of BI, some years ago at The Painful Truth I commented that there were ways out for those who still clung to it. One was the tribal composition of the Jewish Diaspora, and the other had to do with tribal assignments when Gentiles were "grafted in" to the nation of Israel. I didn't mind if COGs clutching for straws passed either of these thoughts off as "New Truth", but I recall James pointed out some holes in my suggestions... bye bye BI...
Anon 5:51 and Anon 6:14
You are facing an insurmountable problem. In order for a theory to have plausibility, it must explain all the facts. While "a nation and company of nations" may be explained by BI, BI does not explain why the British derived people are Gentiles genetically and not Jews. Since this is a scientifically demonstrable fact, you cannot just disregard it.
There are many geopolitical reasons that explain the history of the British people without resorting to passages in the Bible that pertain to Abraham's descendants. There are even Biblically based alternatives. For example, a Jewish Rabbi in Britain suggested to me that USA was actually the Great Babylon, a confluence of peoples, a mart of nations, with great power and great prosperity. He cited the fact that the early British monks identified the Celtic people as descendants of Gomer (a Gentile) and had migrated to the British Isles from north of the Black Sea where they were known as Cimmerians (a name derived from Gomer; Herman Hoeh, who loved connecting similar sounding names without foundation, cast this aside without plausible explanation). In one of the OT prophecies Gomer is identified as one of the powers to stand against the Jewish people and the Messiah at his coming.
I think what I have related above is fanciful and his no merit. But it explains the facts better than BI.
Some observations:
1. You cannot develop a theory that explains a few facts but ignores other important facts and expect to have anyone believe you.
2. Science is not "childish".
3. There is a Hebrew word related to brit and it has nothing to do with the origin of the word British. This is just a Hermanism (as in Hoeh). Look in Wikipedia.
4. Gratuitous and Ad Hominem attacks do not convert your fallacies into truth. You have to bring it.
I believe that belief in BI is a litmus test for having been brain-washed. I believe that people who are brain-washed on a given topic are unable to follow logical discourse on that topic. Let's see if you can prove me wrong.
Why shouldn't we interpret "a nation and company of nations" as China and the Soviet Union?
Near_Earth_Object
You keep doing a strawman argument on my 'academic nonsense' comment. What I said and still say is that God is a prayer answering God. He has miraculously communicated to me that BI is correct. He has done the same to these oppressed, minister abused 'tithe slaves.' Which is why these major splinters are not going away. In my case, God put the image of a vast horde of Americans being herded into slavery. So I believe in a coming nightmare.
Given a choice between believing Near_Earth_Object (or similar) or God, I chose to believe God.
Don't be so smug. The whole world is brainwashed by the schools.
These "interesting" responses substantiate my assertion about logical discourse. I think at this point I will rest my case. Bye.
Self-hypnosis in prayer, 9:47. Self-hypnosis in prayer.
BB
The events you cite are all a function of cause and effect, and random probability, Ben. Science has in many cases harnessed and controlled the randomness. Behavioral Science (and that is a branch of science) can and does predict what certain personality types will do, and develops ways of counteracting or controlling them. Scientists HAVE prevented and do prevent thousands or even millions of deaths. Political scientists do advise world leaders who negotiate trades and treaties, and wars have been averted. My recommendation to you would be that in 2018, you need to broaden your horizons, and stop thinking as if you were living in the ancient times in which so many of these topics and events were mysteries. They are not. They have been analyzed and quantified. Hitler, Pol Pot, and other massively evil leaders have been overwhelmed and defeated by the good people. The same will happen to Kim Jong Un, you'll see!
Science is not the enemy. It does pretty much nullify Armstrongism, but is that really a bad thing? That fact would overwhelm superstition? I think not!
BB
why look at the "company of nations" (commonwealth not withstanding) phrase and totally ignore the phenomena of two most powerful nations ever to exist (as was implied in the Promise), so powerful that they control the purse strings of both china and russia?
why ignore the fact that the jews are a small people that control the communications and finance systems of the world, indeed the hold the mortgage on all industries...
and it is Written that they would do so; it is also Written that upon God Returning the jews to palestine, they would no longer be interfered with by the emphraim...
indeed the brits ruled over palestine long before the general jewish return and were at odds with jews what inhabited palestine during the time leading up to that general return...
BB
Answered prayer is self hypnosis? If you hadn't done the prodigal son, you would understand from personal experience.
Interesting? Hate to say it, but I thought some of the posters were really igging out! Wondered if they were some of Thiel's people. I mean we're all at different stages of development, and I guess everyone's got to start somewhere.
BB
Not if it's done rightl. I certainly don't consider the answered prayer that I receive on a daily basis to be self-hypnosis. If you believe you are getting confirmation of the Armstrong false prophecy mold through your prayers though, that is clearly either self-hypnosis or confirmation bias. That's not even the way in which God answers prayers.
If I pray that $160,000 worth of uninsured equipment that's on several skids and has been lost by the freight company in multiple locations will be found, and it is found actually while I'm praying, that's much different from a warm feeling someone might get when he asks about his Anglo-Saxon buddies being taken into captivity and enslaved. The freight was actually found. Your deal? The jury is still way way out. Why would God not have validated HWA in 1972-75, if HWA were His servant?
People have been praying for Armstrong's tribulation for many decades now. If I had listened to people like you, my own personal holocaust at the hands of Armstrongism would have lasted for many years. If HWA's trib happens now in my lifetime, first, because of my relationship with God, I will be protected, and even if God allows me to suffer certain things, it will be for my growth and edification per Rom. 8:38-39. My faith in God is partly based on the loving and merciful ways in which He handled me through my prodigal times. You can't compare 3-1/2 short years with "the Germans" with 45 additional years of agony in an Armstrong church, plus being held back by the ministers from any personal growth or experience towards Kingdom skills by stupid, arbitrarily authoritarian ministers who aren't even in the game.
Armstrongism is not the truth which they had billed it as. It is a defective product, which if used as intended by it's manufacturer, fails consistently and universally produces bad fruits.
BB
Another point, 5:02. If God answers prayer in the manner that you suggest, then each of the 700 splinters is the one and only "true church". Nobody walks away from "God's True Church" and starts a splinter without lots and lots of your type of prayer! I am certain that each one of these "leaders" feels that God has confirmed their intentions on His behalf through their personal prayers. God just doesn't work that way!
BB
nothing random about the jews returning to palestine as was Promised to them by God (that Promise has been an intrical part of their faith for the longest, just as they believed that the second temple would be built, and it was), and since ww2 was the actuator of that return, clearly it too was not a random event...
nothing random about the brits cessation of vexation of the jews of palestine during that same period of time as was also Prophecied...
nothing random about God also Promising to gather the jews from ethiopia, and indeed the jews did accept them because of the Prophecy...
BB
God did not validate 1975 because it was not of God. His 'servant' sinned big time by proclaiming that date when the holy spirit gave him no such instruction. I call Herb Herbert Baalam Armstrong because of the historic parallels between Baalam and Herb. In fact Baalam was better than Herb in that he faithfully passed on Gods words. God had Herb trained in free market advertising, which rests on a rights respecting limited government. Herb treacherously rejected this for neo commie tyranny. God considers him a traitor. The 'arbitrary authoritarianism' is stench in God's nostrils.
On Herbs death, God allowed the splintering to loosen the tyranny. God is a God of freedom, so there's nothing to say that He personally intervened in the establishment of any of these splinters.
NEO
I showed apreciation for the SCIENCE part of your research.
Perhaps on another thread you could show some apreciation for my view that the STORY of the migration of peoples from the Midde East is completely substantiated by genetic research on evidence found in 250.000 BC, 5000 BC and 1000 BC sequencing.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/dec/28/origins-of-the-irish-down-to-mass-migration-ancient-dna-confirms
https://owlcation.com/stem/Irish-Blood-Genetic-Identity
I am certainly not into proving BI although there are many ways to substantiate THE MYTHS AND LEGENDS from a genetic viewpoint since ALL science points to Iberian and Middle Eastern roots of the Irish.
I am more into the current understanding that these studies, like the research at Trinity College, seems to pop up at times when it is politically conventient, when millions of middle eastern migrants are/were flooding the EU suddenly studies pop up that this has been the case for over 250.000 years.
MY CASE is that at one time during the dark ages (500 AD and the 1900 hundreds) the same narrative was politically convenient too.
Those are in my opinion the roots of BI and its predecessors like the Irish annals speaking about contacts between the Iberian peninsula and Ireland. And it is interesting that at least Trinity College produced a narrative that for the umptieth time corraborates that story for whatever reason.
nck
Ron Dart once mused that the COG’s were going about the promotion of BI in the wrong way. He suggested that a ‘typological’ approach would be the way to go.
Ge 12:2 And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:
Ge 12:3 And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.
Which people today, then, would be displaying the characteristics that would suggest that they are Israel?
Ps 2:8 Ask of me, and I will make the nations your inheritance, the ends of the earth your possession.
Eze 17:23 In the mountain of the height of Israel will I plant it: and it shall bring forth boughs, and bear fruit, and be a goodly cedar: and under it shall dwell all fowl of every wing; in the shadow of the branches thereof shall they dwell.
I would suggest that Britain in the Nineteenth Century and America in the Twentieth Century, warts and all, have been the modern Cosmic Trees that have been, overall, a blessing to the nations.
If you believe in the Millennium/Messianic Age, beginning just after Jacob’s trouble, which peoples today would be the leading candidate that Christ would use to rule the world for him exercising judgment and justice and be a blessing to the nations?
My candidate, out of all the peoples in the world today, that Christ would use, would be the Anglo-Saxon-Celtic and Related Peoples. Any other candidates?
If Britain and America are not genetic Israel I would suggest that they are typological Israel.
“Virtually all the ideas, knowledge, techniques and institutions around which the world revolves came from the European theatre and its ocean offshoots; many of them explicitly from England, which was the principle matrix of modern society… The sober and unpopular truth is that whatever hope there is for mankind – at least for the foreseeable future – lies in the ingenuity and the civilised standards of the West, above all in those western elements permeated by English ideas and traditions… When we are taught by the Russians and the Chinese how to improve the human condition, when the Japanese give us science, and the Africans great literature, when the Arabs show us the road to prosperity and the Latin Americans to freedom, then will be the time to change the axis of our history” (Paul Johnson, “The Offshore Islanders,” (1984), pp.9-10).
Note 1. Levi, Judah, Benjamin, Ruben and Simeon will have higher social status in the Messianic Age than Ephraim and Manasseh. Dan having the lowest social status of them all.
Note 2: “the mountain of the height of Israel” is Zion; cp, Ez 20:40.
I think that so many people like and need to think that they didn't waste their years in Armstrongism, that there was somehow something worthwhile, something worth saving and that it all related to God. Well, there wasn't, and it didn't. Sometimes some things are just a scam. You wouldn't believe the things that I was supposed to do according to some peoples' visions and validations, and I know from the stories of others that they were told some of the same things, and that mysteriously, somehow it coincidentally all tied into Armstrongism. Where do you think people like Dave Pack came from?
It was a crock. I even had to learn all my ethics in the way other humans should be considered and treated after I left Armstrongism. Honestly, I was one of the lucky ones, because I was only involved with it for about twenty years. I got to actually have a life and an awesome career, to learn a lot of things, and to actually experience God's love in a way that I might not have appreciated if I had not been raised in a toxic and abusive cult. In the remote chance that all this crap they taught that bears no resemblance to the character and sense of justice of God turns out to be right, then with about 5 minutes of pain that we won't even have the capacity to remember, those of us who fancy something better have the opportunity to opt out. But, as I've stated before, it's not going to come to that. Something much better awaits us. Just wish the current victims could somehow understand that.
BB
NCK:
Don't know if your are still looking at this - it is about five of six posts behind now. I read the articles that you referred to. These are newspaper articles so it is difficult to sift through the data.
The bare essentials are: scientists examined the autosomal DNA from a skeleton of a woman from Ireland dating from around 5,000 BP. Her genome indicates she is related genetically to people from Spain or Sardinia. These Mediterranean people are thought to have brought agriculture to Ireland. Agriculture came from the middle east, hence, to connection to the middle east. Unfortunately, the newspaper couch this to sound like the woman and her tribe migrated directly from the middle east to Ireland.
These early Mediterraneans were absorbed by later waves of Celtic/Anglo-Saxon migration from Eastern Europe. The agricultural connection is based on Diffusionist Theory. I think this is weak. The Mediterraneans could easily have discovered agriculture independently.
The bottom line is that this in no way supports the idea that the modern day Irish have their genetic origin in the Middle East or that the modern day Irish are connected to Jews.
12.09 AM
Ron Dart 'jumped ship' before Herb died. Had he left after Herbs death, fine, but to have left beforehand to do his own thing was a act of desertion. So I wouldn't quote Ron to gain credibility for some point.
NEO
Yes, am still reading. Although both of us do not seem to have enough stake in it all to dig to the primary source but stick to the newspaper article.
-I do know that people are not born from stones or springs. So they had to come from somewhere
-It is possible/highly likely that modern day irish have no middle eastern origin or that they are related to a people from there
-Most of BI theory centers around the elites. We do know that elites from time immemorial have intermingled with kings and princes from very far away.
-My only point in in all of this is that if someone makes a promise to a certain group or people in a specific time frame. And this promise is going to be fulfilled on a latter date after they moved from locality. It should be possible to discern from genetics where the two match. a) from bones in the original place of promise and b) from modern research.
As I recall 70% of Irish moved to the USA or elsewhere mid 19th century. So perhaps people should look in those places.
What I do know about "Celts" and "Germans" is that from history it is hard to discern when they are denoted as "migrant tribes" or called that way after they settled and mingled like "a people." Most of those tribes had different names for themselves than what they were called by the Romans for political of geographical reasons. Much like "an American" did not exist pre 1600's.
At least BI proponents need to discuss the matter including modern scientific understanding and the bar has been raised.
On ocassion I watch tv programs where two "sisters" do a gene test to see if there father was really their father because of famiy rumors. On ocassion it turns out that they really do not share the same father. Of course they emphasize that they will remain sisters always on camera. But still, it seems that science took something away from them.
This brings us to what we can prove.
The impact on politics has been unmistaken. Science will not explain that.
It is like a group of scientists coming together in 90 years calculating and explaining that "Trumps Wall" from economic and construction perspective never could have been a feasible project. Most scientists would agree on that today even.
It takes historians and political scientists to explain 100 milion people having a go at the idea of a wall. (which from a scientific viewpoint will turn into tighter controls)
But hey, I do not rule out that some BI proponent comes up with a solution to the genetic coding. I can come up with a couple solutions to circumvent it. But it seems the theory served its purpose in its due time. Just like "the idea" of the wall, served its political purpose in its time.
nck
nck, it's much more feasible that Abraham's seed was Jesus Christ, and that therefore Christians are modern Israel, and it has nothing to do with genetics. Paul says as much, but he uses the most prominent group that the other tribes were assimilated by, the Jews. That didn't appeal to HWA because he labelled Sunday-keeping Christians as falsely so-called. Christians are not monochromatic. Every ethnic group known to man has its Christians, and the US and Europe have historically been the beacons that disseminated the results of the Protestant Reformation around the world. It also makes sense that if Christians anywhere lost or forgot their values, correction would be imminent.
"on ocassion I watch tv programs where two "sisters" do a gene test to see if there father was really their father because of famiy rumors."
Funny you mention that, nck. I actually just submitted a DNA test for a similar reason (a gap in the family history that I'd like to be filled regarding a missing grandparent).
January 2, 2018 at 7:15 AM
Yes, that is entirely feasible. Although you seem to label catholics like hwa labelled "christians so called".
I think you are quoting wcg doctrine. As wcg taught miracles happened to have the spanish armada blown away so protestantism could flourish.
The difference is that wcg required genetic and physical foreshadowings of spiritual truths.
As a matter of fact. In the infamous 5 million "bestseller" it is said that God would be a liar if he would not stay true to the physical fulfillment of his promises.
RSK. (whatever happens I will be your "virtual bro from cyberspace")
ALL emperors were adopted as Jesus quoted Roman Law, therefore we call him abba father in the spirit of adoption, which was a roman custom and legal status"
nck
Hi 12:09
You write:
“So I wouldn't quote Ron to gain credibility for some point.”
I did not quote Ron to gain credibility but to acknowledge him for making, what I consider, a valuable point. I credit, or at least try to, all my sources that I utilise. I don’t think HWA was a shining light in this regard.
I suggest that it would have been better to engage the validity of the post, not resorting to a put down. You only lose credibility resorting to the latter.
By the way do you think HWA came up with the understanding, wrong by the way, that Elohim is “a uni-plural noun”?
“ Elohim (sometimes "El" or "Elah"), English form "God," the first of the three primary names of Deity, is a uni-plural noun…” (Cyrus Ingerson Scofield, Scofield Reference Notes, 1917).
“And so it was that in the fall of 1926 [aged 34] … that I entered into an in-depth study of the Bible for the first time in my life” (Herbert W. Armstrong, Autobiography of Herbert W. Armstrong, Vol.1, p.291).
Examples of Elohim:
Ex 4:14b Is not Aaron the Levite thy brother?
Ex 4:15a And thou shalt speak unto him, and put words in his mouth:
Ex 4:16 And he shall be thy spokesman unto the people: and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God [Elohim] to him (AV & NIV).
Ex 6:29 That the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, I am the LORD: speak thou unto Pharaoh king of Egypt all that I say unto thee
Ex 7:1 And the LORD said unto Moses, See, I have made thee a god [Elohim] to Pharaoh: and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet.
1 Ki 11:33 Ashtoreth the goddess [elohim] of the Zidonians, Chemosh the god [elohim] of the Moabites, and Milcom the god [elohim] of the children of Ammon.
Ephraim also ends in the masculine plural.
"Ron Dart 'jumped ship' before Herb died. Had he left after Herbs death, fine, but to have left beforehand to do his own thing was a act of desertion. So I wouldn't quote Ron to gain credibility for some point."
Ron Dart was suspended from speaking in WCG and told to sit and do nothing. The political situation was bleak, as Stan Rader was in charge, and was purging anyone who might be a threat to his desire to succeed HWA, whose death seemed imminent. Plus, Dart was uncomfortable receiving people's hard-earned tithe money for doing nothing. Also, Dart stated that he was a minister for Jesus Christ, and if WCG didn't want him to do that, he would have to go elsewhere. So, he did. Rather than costing him credibility, those actions make him very credible.
I understand where the Dart comment is comming from. I corresponded with him a little in the eighties. But it didnt feel comfortable in the sense that he was in a satellite as the mothership was going strong.
I don t know exactly when he went with gta but rader was baptized at a very late stage. It s hard to believe rader coveted any spiritual office very much.
Even less an apostleship so called.
Nck
Post a Comment