Tuesday, April 23, 2019

Holy Spirit. What the WT Teaches. What the Bible Teaches. One and the Same?????




The Holy Spirit According to the WT

In their book Aid to Bible Understanding under Holy Spirit you are directed to "Spirit." We find here the WT's definition for Holy Spirit on pages 1542-1543 under the subtitle "GOD'S ACTIVE FORCE; HOLY SPIRIT. Not a Person."

"The scriptures themselves unite to show that Good's holy spirit is not a person but is God's active force by which he accomplishes his purpose and executes his will."

“The holy spirit is not God and it is not a part of a Trinity. . . . To a certain extent, it can be likened to electricity.” (Should You Believe in the Trinity, WTBTS, 1989)


The Holy Spirit According to the Bible

WT’s Different Spirit Is Not God, however:

The Holy Spirit is God which can clearly be seen in Acts 5:3-4 where Peter confronts Ananias as to why he lied to the Holy Spirit and tells him that he had “not lied to men but to God.” It is a clear declaration that lying to the Holy Spirit is lying to God.

The Holy Spirit is God because He possesses the characteristics of God. For example, His omnipresence is seen in Psalm 139:7-8, “Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.”

The Holy Spirit is God because he possesses the characteristic of omniscience in I Cor. 2:10-11. “But God has revealed it to us by his Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man’s spirit within him? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.”

Consider John 14:26, I am using the KIT (purple cover which you download here, which really drives home my point: “But the helper, the holy spirit, which the Father will send in my name that one will teach YOU all things and bring back to YOUR minds all the things I told YOU.”

The relative pronoun which conveys the thought that the “holy spirit” is not a person but an impersonal power since in modern English whom is used to designate a person and which to designate a thing. John did not intend to say that the helper whom the Father would send was “a thing” or “impersonal force” is made clear by the demonstrative pronoun John did use—ekeinos (see the KIT). Ekeinos is the masculine singular form of that one. If John wanted to say that the Holy Spirit is neutral (neither masculine nor feminine,) he would have used ekeino for that one. The meaning is clear—John wanted to say that one, that person, will teach you all things. The WT does the same thing in John 15:26. John writes ekeinos (masculine) and the WT writes which.

John states a third time that the Holy Spirit is ekeinos (masculine) at John 16:13 and 14, however, the WT misses this one and makes the Holy Spirit a he and not an it. It reads in the KIT “However, when that one (ekeinos) arrives, the spirt of the truth, HE will guide YOU into all the truth, for HE will not speak of HIS own impulse, but what things HE hears HE will speak, and HE will declare to YOU . . .That one will glorify me because HE will receive from what is mine and will declare it to YOU.”

Lastly, consider Ephesians 4:30, “Also, do not be grieving God’s holy spirit, with which YOU have been sealed for a day of releasing by ransom.” How can you grieve an impersonal force—i.e. an electrical current? Yet the WT uses which instead of whom.  In light of John 14:26 it should read whom and not which. As usual, the WT changes scripture to align with its doctrine instead of changing its doctrine to align with scripture.




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