If only 144,000 Witnesses will rule with Jesus in Heaven, and if the Wikipedia entry is anywhere close in the estimate of 7,100,000 members in existence…. it seems like a lot of them would end up with the short end of the stick.
According to official Jehova’s Witness printings the 144,000 were filled in 1935, so anyone born after that is SOL, no heaven for you. They just get to live on earth with all the other JW’s. Everyone else, hope you like barbecue.
one thing they forgot is those 144,000 in Revelations are explicitly mentioned as being Jewish. So I think there are bigger issues for them then over enrollment No circumsision, no crown for you!
Can I please bring some accuracy to these comments before it becomes a complete tardfest?
144’000 is a number that is very specifically stated in the Bible. It says categorically – 144’000 will rule in heaven with Christ. Everybody else, “the other sheep” are resurrected and live on earth, restored to ideal conditions, after Armageddon. Study the Bible, it’s not difficult.
Anyway,
This cartoon is simply very bluntly and unempathetically discussing Jehovah’s witnesses beliefs rather than presenting *any* understanding or scriptual basis behind it. It’s grade A flamebait material, with added “”"scare”"” quotes.
Quite possibly the biggest pile I’ve read in some time. Quite possibly the most contradicting, self-fulfilling-prophesying book ever, written by numerous individuals who failed to get their story straight beforehand due to the centuries that separated them, with some scrolls thrown in here and some taken out there, translated from Hebrew to Greek to German to English (I’m sure I forgot a few steps in there) with NO loss in translation whatsoever, right?
Go read Leviticus and let’s talk about how easy reading it is.
You gotta remember that the books of the Bible were written in times when things like large numbers and dates were irrelevant. The people of those times lived from one holiday to the next, or harvest to the next. To say that Adam lived to be 900 years old could just have easily said that he lived to be 2,500 years old, meaning that he was older than everyone else by a lot, (duh, he’s Adam, the first human). When it’s read in Revelation that 144,000 are sealed and saved, that is just multiplying vast numbers together from the 12 tribes, 12,000 each. But the point is that 12,000 is a big enough number that people just looked at a crowd of that size and never really knew exactly how many there were, just “too numerous to record.”
Obviously, well, not obviously actually, the end times are noted by massive destruction and wars and anti-christs and such, but the end does not come until one thing for sure happens, and that is when the Gospel of Jesus reaches every tribe and tongue, and according to the International Mission Board’s database last time I checked, there were several thousand people groups, (somewhere near 7,000, fact check needed) with whom the Gospel has not been delivered. Also, keep in mind that the purpose is not to convert people to Christians, but share the message of what Jesus taught about God and salvation. It is not up to humans to save other humans, that kind of defeats the purpose of a divine savior, doesn’t it?
As for Leviticus, yea, it’s a pretty gnarly book of the Bible to read. But it has a function too, and that is to show the difference in salvation through the Grace of God, and the works of man as a substitute. The Mosaic law, all those hundreds of rules written out, including “eye for an eye” and some crap about concubines, were all written by man as corollaries to the Ten Commandments, is a sort of contest to see “who was more pious” in the eyes of man. God still doesn’t care about such goofy rules, and Jesus came to show that with his proclamation of the two greatest commandments, love God, and love your neighbor. Each of the commandments are based on one of the two. Man is born into sin, it’s our nature to sin. Man cannot enter heaven with sin, because God is the opposite of sin. God’s punishment for sin is death. In the Old testament, the sinner sought repentance through the sacrifice of an offering which took the blame for his sin. In the new testament, Jesus put an end to that by sacrificing himself for the sins of everyone who would believe in him. That, is the Bible in a nutshell.
The problem is the cartoon is so bad we can’t tell if it was made by someone trying to ridicule the Jehovah’s Witnesss or if it was made by one of them and he’s the worst director ever. We don’t even need to discuss anyone’s individual beliefs. The cartoon itself is phail.
@Kroc: It’s clearly stated that the 144,000 will come from the 12 Jewish tribes, which makes sense given the audience of the book.
It’s important to understand that, despite what popular culture likes to teach, Revelations is NOT considered “end times” prophesy by main-line Christian denominations. It was a message of hope for those living under the purges of Nero and Domitian. (References to the undying beast, for example talk about the fact that life actually got WORSE after Nero died.) It’s audience was a very specific set of Jewish Christians (yes, that’s how you would describe the first group of Christians) living in a specific period of time.
Simply looking at the (original) language of the book, you see that John of Patmos is, unlike the Gospel writer John (the two are often confused) clearly a Jew and his work is clearly aimed at a Jewish audience. Additionally, the Gospel of John is written in fluent, lyrical, and poetic Greek, while the Greek of Revelations is more clumsy and filled with linguistic artifacts that would be common if it were written by a native Aramaic speaker. The liberal use of verses lifted from Isaiah and Daniel in Revelations is another clue to its Jewish’s origins and audience. (Isaiah is commonly quoted in the “Jewish” gospels—Mark and Matthew—while it is much less frequently quoted in Luke and John, and when it is, it’s typically part of the common narrative that runs through all four gospels.)
The early church founders wrestled greatly over the inclusion of Revelations, and it was in and out of the canon for almost 800 years. Martin Luther taught that it was clearly not of Christ’s authorship, and therefore not relevant to Christian faith and considered dropping it from his German translation of the bible, but left it in for his own reasons. (Namely that he declared the Pope the Anti-Christ. I think he was a little bitter about the death sentence.)
This isn’t to say that there are valuable lessons in the book of Revelations. The first century was a very difficult one for the early church, and Revelations sends a message about God’s steadfast love and devotion to His creation, the importantce of the growth of the (small-c) catholic church, and the enduring nature of His covenant with mankind. These ARE important messages for Christians to understand, and it’s why Revelations made the canon while any number of other first century apocalyptic texts (and there were plenty) were left on the cutting room floor.
It’s really no different than Paul’s epistles. They were specifically addressed to individual churches, but there’s still great value in the larger message. (In fact, Revelations even begins by addressing seven individual churches…some good, some bad…and giving them advice in a similar manner as Paul.)
So the book is important, as are its messages, but to interpret it as a “sneak preview” of what’s to come in the “end times” is simply ignoring the historical reality of the book.
Hey, it’s a perfect example of why all religion is a crock. Not just JWs, or Mormons, or Southern Baptists, or Vudun, or Shinto, or anything else – it’s all humans trying to explain things without resorting to logic and science. So it’s all wrong.
Except Pastafarianism. All hail the Flying Spaghetti Monster!
If anyone cares to know the truth, this video was NOT MADE BY JEHOVAH’S WITNESSES, but to try to explain it. It is poorly done and anyone who is sincere would know that before posting it or they would remove it. It might bring out the foolishness and ridicule in viewers, as most of the previous comments show but it is still DISHONEST to attribute it to Jehovah’s Witnesses. Some actual videos they DO make can be downloaded at http://www.watchtower.org/cgi-bin/lib/ProcessForm.pl
(Proverbs 14:6) “6 The ridiculer has sought to find wisdom, and there is none; but to the understanding one knowledge is an easy thing.”
Icesnake – This is a perfect example of why all religion is a crock, much the same way the eugenics movement is a perfect example of why all science is a crock, or so says your logic.
Why can’t people just let others believe what they want and stop all this talk of religion in the media and online and stuff!!! And FYI,that video only shows the views of a very small population of Christians not all of us.
I think everyone seems to be missing the the moral of the cartoon. If you do not want to be judged by Jebus’ magik missiles, don’t live in New York. Especially next to a giant dam!
Thank you danno, you made good points on the true origins of Revelations that few want to admit. Certain groups of Christians don’t admit that because they use the fear for power, and mainstream media won’t admit that because it makes it easy to dismiss Christians. I’ve gotten rather tired of trying to explain that to people…
this video proves religion is a crock huh? that’s why almost every religious person here is saying that video does not depict ANY form of Christianity correctly? an ex-JW just said that this video was inaccurate. yet they are all ignored and this just gets put in a pile of “proof” against religion.
and be careful with science. not all of it is true. just because a person with a DR in from of their name says something is fact doesn’t mean it is. and THEORIES are constantly proven wrong and rewritten.
Scott this is quite simply anti – jehovah’s witness propaganda, it is factually inaccurate and I feel kinda queasy after watching it. I know you thought it was funny with jesus blowing crap up, after all that is kinda funny, its the rest of the video that concerns me.
as a former JW i want everyone to know that this video is BS and if you care to know the truth all you have to do is ask a JW.
I kinda wish you didn’t post this… but its your site, and I’m not offended enough that i would stop coming here I like you comics and podcasts too much.
Anyway just my 2 cents, take care and keep on keep’in on
@Kroc – you mention that people shouldn’t change religion…
It said in the beginning they changed the dates of the end time, invisible visit, and armageddon, which didn’t happen in 1914 as they had hoped. If that is true, how is that not changing religion?
Catholicism has changed religion since Peter and Paul. Protestantism and the eastern Orthodoxies changed religion to react to Catholic changes, and have made myriad changes of their own. Mormonism added another book, even after the previous book said to do so was blasphemy. It changed to comply with secular law as well.
Then you have scientology, wicca, animism, voodoo, buddhism, islam, shinto, dao, zoroaster, etc. etc.
I think there is some higher power, yes, but I am not going to sell it to anyone else, nor let anyone sell anything to me. I’m a happy mercatorian.
Do what makes you happy and doesn’t hurt anyone else and you will be fine.
No comment from me. I’m just adding a comment to help push the comment count really high so that everyone thinks that this cartoon is worth all of the attention that it is getting.
Worshiping a wrathful omnipotent being that will destroy the Earth and worshiping an undetonated nuclear bomb that could destroy the Earth are so incredibly similar it goes beyond “not even funny” all the way back to being funny.
Am I the only person that thought this was going to be some “look how much Jesus is like He-man kids” evangelical film when he held the sword up? Too bad it didn’t live up to that Admit it, a cheesy cartoon like that showing Jeebus with all the super powers of your favourite 80s cartoon heroes wold rock. So long as he’s not wearing wonder woman’s outfit… *shudder*
Anyways… I think what people are trying to say instead of, “oop, this just goes to prove that all religion is bad…” that, “this is one more example of bad religion.” but I’m just a not particularly devout Pastafarian looking at a video showing Jesus/Michael as a fire mage in a starting zone…
Praise Jebus..
And out of whos rectum did they pull 144,000 hmm
If only 144,000 Witnesses will rule with Jesus in Heaven, and if the Wikipedia entry is anywhere close in the estimate of 7,100,000 members in existence…. it seems like a lot of them would end up with the short end of the stick.
I’m sticking with Pastafarianism.
Darn those Jenova Witnesses.
Well that was comforting, Jesus was a shapeshifter!
As a ex-Jehovah Witness, I am very surprised I have never seen this video. Also surprised at how the teachings have not changed.
Ha. anybody notice the man it the blue suit at the end? =]
wow…. Jesus is such a dick
According to official Jehova’s Witness printings the 144,000 were filled in 1935, so anyone born after that is SOL, no heaven for you. They just get to live on earth with all the other JW’s. Everyone else, hope you like barbecue.
I like the way it just says
‘… and Jesus (Alias Michael)….
Thank god we know his alias….
Wait, i think i know someone called Michael…. OMG
Hmm, guess we’d better start up an army to fight Jesus when he decides to come for us.
one thing they forgot is those 144,000 in Revelations are explicitly mentioned as being Jewish. So I think there are bigger issues for them then over enrollment
No circumsision, no crown for you!
Wow. I had no idea that Jahova’s Witness’ believed that.
The fact remains that they’re still not as Tom Cruise and his scientology wierdness.
Can I please bring some accuracy to these comments before it becomes a complete tardfest?
144’000 is a number that is very specifically stated in the Bible. It says categorically – 144’000 will rule in heaven with Christ. Everybody else, “the other sheep” are resurrected and live on earth, restored to ideal conditions, after Armageddon. Study the Bible, it’s not difficult.
Anyway,
This cartoon is simply very bluntly and unempathetically discussing Jehovah’s witnesses beliefs rather than presenting *any* understanding or scriptual basis behind it. It’s grade A flamebait material, with added “”"scare”"” quotes.
You’ve opened one heck of a can of worms Scott.
@Justin,
God doesn’t change, so the teachings shouldn’t either; right?
Better man bends himself to fit God than man bend God to fit himself as is with religion today.
Mormons. The correct answer was Moooormons.
“Study the Bible, it’s not difficult.”
Quite possibly the biggest pile I’ve read in some time. Quite possibly the most contradicting, self-fulfilling-prophesying book ever, written by numerous individuals who failed to get their story straight beforehand due to the centuries that separated them, with some scrolls thrown in here and some taken out there, translated from Hebrew to Greek to German to English (I’m sure I forgot a few steps in there) with NO loss in translation whatsoever, right?
Go read Leviticus and let’s talk about how easy reading it is.
/sigh
You gotta remember that the books of the Bible were written in times when things like large numbers and dates were irrelevant. The people of those times lived from one holiday to the next, or harvest to the next. To say that Adam lived to be 900 years old could just have easily said that he lived to be 2,500 years old, meaning that he was older than everyone else by a lot, (duh, he’s Adam, the first human). When it’s read in Revelation that 144,000 are sealed and saved, that is just multiplying vast numbers together from the 12 tribes, 12,000 each. But the point is that 12,000 is a big enough number that people just looked at a crowd of that size and never really knew exactly how many there were, just “too numerous to record.”
Obviously, well, not obviously actually, the end times are noted by massive destruction and wars and anti-christs and such, but the end does not come until one thing for sure happens, and that is when the Gospel of Jesus reaches every tribe and tongue, and according to the International Mission Board’s database last time I checked, there were several thousand people groups, (somewhere near 7,000, fact check needed) with whom the Gospel has not been delivered. Also, keep in mind that the purpose is not to convert people to Christians, but share the message of what Jesus taught about God and salvation. It is not up to humans to save other humans, that kind of defeats the purpose of a divine savior, doesn’t it?
As for Leviticus, yea, it’s a pretty gnarly book of the Bible to read. But it has a function too, and that is to show the difference in salvation through the Grace of God, and the works of man as a substitute. The Mosaic law, all those hundreds of rules written out, including “eye for an eye” and some crap about concubines, were all written by man as corollaries to the Ten Commandments, is a sort of contest to see “who was more pious” in the eyes of man. God still doesn’t care about such goofy rules, and Jesus came to show that with his proclamation of the two greatest commandments, love God, and love your neighbor. Each of the commandments are based on one of the two. Man is born into sin, it’s our nature to sin. Man cannot enter heaven with sin, because God is the opposite of sin. God’s punishment for sin is death. In the Old testament, the sinner sought repentance through the sacrifice of an offering which took the blame for his sin. In the new testament, Jesus put an end to that by sacrificing himself for the sins of everyone who would believe in him. That, is the Bible in a nutshell.
The problem is the cartoon is so bad we can’t tell if it was made by someone trying to ridicule the Jehovah’s Witnesss or if it was made by one of them and he’s the worst director ever. We don’t even need to discuss anyone’s individual beliefs. The cartoon itself is phail.
that…was…interesting. and I should want to be a jehova’s witness why??????
Scott you dastardly instigator you… you… BASTARD!!!
@Kroc: It’s clearly stated that the 144,000 will come from the 12 Jewish tribes, which makes sense given the audience of the book.
It’s important to understand that, despite what popular culture likes to teach, Revelations is NOT considered “end times” prophesy by main-line Christian denominations. It was a message of hope for those living under the purges of Nero and Domitian. (References to the undying beast, for example talk about the fact that life actually got WORSE after Nero died.) It’s audience was a very specific set of Jewish Christians (yes, that’s how you would describe the first group of Christians) living in a specific period of time.
Simply looking at the (original) language of the book, you see that John of Patmos is, unlike the Gospel writer John (the two are often confused) clearly a Jew and his work is clearly aimed at a Jewish audience. Additionally, the Gospel of John is written in fluent, lyrical, and poetic Greek, while the Greek of Revelations is more clumsy and filled with linguistic artifacts that would be common if it were written by a native Aramaic speaker. The liberal use of verses lifted from Isaiah and Daniel in Revelations is another clue to its Jewish’s origins and audience. (Isaiah is commonly quoted in the “Jewish” gospels—Mark and Matthew—while it is much less frequently quoted in Luke and John, and when it is, it’s typically part of the common narrative that runs through all four gospels.)
The early church founders wrestled greatly over the inclusion of Revelations, and it was in and out of the canon for almost 800 years. Martin Luther taught that it was clearly not of Christ’s authorship, and therefore not relevant to Christian faith and considered dropping it from his German translation of the bible, but left it in for his own reasons. (Namely that he declared the Pope the Anti-Christ. I think he was a little bitter about the death sentence.)
This isn’t to say that there are valuable lessons in the book of Revelations. The first century was a very difficult one for the early church, and Revelations sends a message about God’s steadfast love and devotion to His creation, the importantce of the growth of the (small-c) catholic church, and the enduring nature of His covenant with mankind. These ARE important messages for Christians to understand, and it’s why Revelations made the canon while any number of other first century apocalyptic texts (and there were plenty) were left on the cutting room floor.
It’s really no different than Paul’s epistles. They were specifically addressed to individual churches, but there’s still great value in the larger message. (In fact, Revelations even begins by addressing seven individual churches…some good, some bad…and giving them advice in a similar manner as Paul.)
So the book is important, as are its messages, but to interpret it as a “sneak preview” of what’s to come in the “end times” is simply ignoring the historical reality of the book.
Hey, it’s a perfect example of why all religion is a crock. Not just JWs, or Mormons, or Southern Baptists, or Vudun, or Shinto, or anything else – it’s all humans trying to explain things without resorting to logic and science. So it’s all wrong.
Except Pastafarianism. All hail the Flying Spaghetti Monster!
I KNEW IT!
Jesus is a fire mage.
no, didn’t you see the lightning? he’s a shaman
If anyone cares to know the truth, this video was NOT MADE BY JEHOVAH’S WITNESSES, but to try to explain it. It is poorly done and anyone who is sincere would know that before posting it or they would remove it. It might bring out the foolishness and ridicule in viewers, as most of the previous comments show but it is still DISHONEST to attribute it to Jehovah’s Witnesses. Some actual videos they DO make can be downloaded at http://www.watchtower.org/cgi-bin/lib/ProcessForm.pl
(Proverbs 14:6) “6 The ridiculer has sought to find wisdom, and there is none; but to the understanding one knowledge is an easy thing.”
hehee…Jesus can fart lightning and spit fireballs.
Icesnake – This is a perfect example of why all religion is a crock, much the same way the eugenics movement is a perfect example of why all science is a crock, or so says your logic.
*giggle* I don’t care who made it or what it’s supposed to be for, this is a hoot. I couldn’t help but think of this line from the JoCo song:
Here’s an FYI, you’re all gonna die screaming!
Why can’t people just let others believe what they want and stop all this talk of religion in the media and online and stuff!!! And FYI,that video only shows the views of a very small population of Christians not all of us.
That was like a kick ass Hanna Barberra cartoon. I totally would have watched Jebus saturday mornings if that was on.
BTW, when they showed Jebus destroying the earth, did anyone else picture him saying “Mwa ha ha ha!”
I think everyone seems to be missing the the moral of the cartoon. If you do not want to be judged by Jebus’ magik missiles, don’t live in New York. Especially next to a giant dam!
Thank you danno, you made good points on the true origins of Revelations that few want to admit. Certain groups of Christians don’t admit that because they use the fear for power, and mainstream media won’t admit that because it makes it easy to dismiss Christians. I’ve gotten rather tired of trying to explain that to people…
this video proves religion is a crock huh?
that’s why almost every religious person here is saying that video does not depict ANY form of Christianity correctly? an ex-JW just said that this video was inaccurate. yet they are all ignored and this just gets put in a pile of “proof” against religion.
and be careful with science. not all of it is true. just because a person with a DR in from of their name says something is fact doesn’t mean it is. and THEORIES are constantly proven wrong and rewritten.
Scott this is quite simply anti – jehovah’s witness propaganda, it is factually inaccurate and I feel kinda queasy after watching it. I know you thought it was funny with jesus blowing crap up, after all that is kinda funny, its the rest of the video that concerns me.
as a former JW i want everyone to know that this video is BS and if you care to know the truth all you have to do is ask a JW.
I kinda wish you didn’t post this… but its your site, and I’m not offended enough that i would stop coming here I like you comics and podcasts too much.
Anyway just my 2 cents, take care and keep on keep’in on
@Kroc – you mention that people shouldn’t change religion…
It said in the beginning they changed the dates of the end time, invisible visit, and armageddon, which didn’t happen in 1914 as they had hoped. If that is true, how is that not changing religion?
Catholicism has changed religion since Peter and Paul. Protestantism and the eastern Orthodoxies changed religion to react to Catholic changes, and have made myriad changes of their own. Mormonism added another book, even after the previous book said to do so was blasphemy. It changed to comply with secular law as well.
Then you have scientology, wicca, animism, voodoo, buddhism, islam, shinto, dao, zoroaster, etc. etc.
I think there is some higher power, yes, but I am not going to sell it to anyone else, nor let anyone sell anything to me. I’m a happy mercatorian.
Do what makes you happy and doesn’t hurt anyone else and you will be fine.
Sorry I left out Judaism. I thought it was mentioned enough, up above.
I think Scott’s point of this post is making light of just how silly this video is. I doubt he think it is the truth -_-
Relax people
i think Scott just wants to spread his Mormon agenda!
BTW, wouldn’t it be cool after the “Jesus kills us all scene”, they showed Thundar, Arial and Uklu riding by on there horses. haha
No comment from me. I’m just adding a comment to help push the comment count really high so that everyone thinks that this cartoon is worth all of the attention that it is getting.
Oh, and “Wonder-twin powers… ACTIVATE! Form of… a giant purple gorilla! Shape of… a peaceful river to baptise the giant gorilla in!”
Ahh hail the FSM. Silly Christians.
lawl religion
Worshiping a wrathful omnipotent being that will destroy the Earth and worshiping an undetonated nuclear bomb that could destroy the Earth are so incredibly similar it goes beyond “not even funny” all the way back to being funny.
Am I the only person that thought this was going to be some “look how much Jesus is like He-man kids” evangelical film when he held the sword up? Too bad it didn’t live up to that
Admit it, a cheesy cartoon like that showing Jeebus with all the super powers of your favourite 80s cartoon heroes wold rock. So long as he’s not wearing wonder woman’s outfit… *shudder*
Wonder Jebus!!! Dum dum dum de dum dum dum dum…… Wonder Jebus!!!!
@JT…. hey, don’t knock a good story-book!
Anyways… I think what people are trying to say instead of, “oop, this just goes to prove that all religion is bad…” that, “this is one more example of bad religion.” but I’m just a not particularly devout Pastafarian looking at a video showing Jesus/Michael as a fire mage in a starting zone…
I remember when this was part of the “Freaky Phantom Power Hour” on NBC in 1973.
Ummm, I’m going to bypass all the religious stuff above (twice a year Catholic here
) and just say this:
WTF????
this cartoon tells me 2 things….
Jesus is invisible…. i have NEVER heard that before [\sarcasm]
and the entire population of New York are Jehovas witness.