Schedule
Congregation Book Study:
Draw Close to Jehovah, chapter 1, par. 10-17
Theocratic Ministry School
Bible Reading: Genesis 6-10
No. 1: Genesis 9:18–10:7
No. 2: If Someone Says, ‘As Long as You Believe in Jesus, It Really Does Not Matter What Church You Belong To’ (rs p. 332 ¶2)
No. 3: Aaron—Continue Faithful in Spite of Human Weaknesses (it-1 p. 10 ¶4–p. 11 ¶3)
Service Meeting
10 min: The Value of Repetition in the Ministry
10 min: Men Who Minister in a Fine Manner
10 min: “Take as a Pattern the Prophets—Micah
Comments
This week our Bible reading takes us to the flood. Now think about the fact that 1,600 years of human history are covered in a mere ten chapters of Genesis. Ten short chapters, one and half millennia. We know far more about our so-called “dark ages” then we know about the pre-flood world. Have you ever tried to do the population growth math? Eve gave birth to Seth when she was 120 or more. Noah’s had children in his 500th year. Even if we allowed for lifespans of our day, 1,600 years is still enough to put people everywhere on earth. We always imagine this tiny population in and around Mesopotamia, but if that’s all there were, why a global flood? Seems like colossal overkill. Jehovah expressed compassion for the domestic animals of Ninevah. (Johan 4:9-11) So why destroy all animal life on earth just to extinguish a small Eastern European population?
Allowing for even 100 years of fertility such as Eve evinced; and given an average lifetime of 500 years (to be conservative) and allowing for one child every two years (remember, no birth control to speak of) we get to a population in the hundreds of millions or even billions in just the first 1,000 years. Such is the power of exponential growth. It is very likely that the human population had extended around the globe and that there were nations and empires. Sure it’s all conjecture. Maybe Jehovah limited the birth rate. Maybe there were vast wars and pestilences. Who knows. Why is there so little information? Questions with no answers. But again, why a global flood?
One final word. You’ll notice the final Service Meeting part is on Micah, again emphasizing the waiting attitude of this past week’s Watchtower. It is hard to imagine this as mere coincidence; especially as we embark on the second hundred years of Christ’s invisible presence with no end in sight.
I don’t need the end to come in five years or less. Those who frequent this web site often make similar comments. We serve at the pleasure of the king and when he sees fit to bring the end, so be it. We don’t need any contrived time calculations to keep us going. Let us hope that the brotherhood soon rejects these artificial ploys to keep us anxious and just gets down to the job of worshiping the Father in spirit and truth.
Archived Comments
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Comment by Anonymous Too on 2014-01-13 22:21:08
Regarding the history of humanity and Genesis 10:
In considering the re-population of the world by Noah's sons, one wonders why Eve rather than Noah's wife is considered the “mother of all the living.” Gen 3:20.
A brief diversion into genetics: humans have 46 chromosomes, but egg and sperm cells have only half that, or 23, allowing for sexual reproduction by the joining of sperm to egg. But mothers pass on egg cells to their daughters without the father's 23 chromosomes, maintaining a genetic line of maternal descent. So it was the unnamed wives of Noah's three sons that became the mothers of all human families, and their daughters and grand-daughters became wives and mothers to the developing family and tribal structure of humanity, fostered by their 11 sons.
Modern genetics can analyze this lineage, which slowly spread from continent to continent, mainly along coastlines and land bridges. Later, sailing ships and more modern transportation disrupted this linear pattern of descent, creating the hodge-podge of today.
But in Genesis chapter 10, we observe the 70 families of the earth that became nations. This master lineage of humanity is repeated in 1st Chronicles 1 , and is also traced as to maternal descent of Jesus through Mary back to Eve by the physician Luke at Luke 3:23-38.
The ocean explorer, Robert Ballard, is convinced that the bottom of the Black Sea on the north shore of Turkey contains a world civilization, drowned when the flood of Noah's day overwhelmed the mountain barriers around the original Eden. See http://www.icr.org/article/7263/ and http://www.pbs.org/saf/1207/features/noah.htm
Details of the 70 nations descending from Noah, and more particularly the three women chosen by his sons as wives is laid out at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sons_of_Noah
And excellent map of the distribution of these tribes is at:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0e/Josephustable3.jpgReply by apollos0fAlexandria on 2014-01-14 09:21:27
The "mother of all the living" couldn't be Noah's wife though, because Noah's son's wives were not through her. Or am I missing something?
Reply by Anonymous Too on 2014-01-14 09:29:23
That was the point - that all lineage can be traced to Noah as the "father of all the living," but we don't normally credit him with that - and certainly not his wife.
The genetic principle of reproduction of the species through maternal passing of haploid egg cells without interaction with males chromosomes (the father-mother sexual union is just the egg's way of reproducing itself) is no where discussed in WT literature.
Nevertheless, the Bible explains it by its genealogy, and Josephus went great lengths to document it. The map link is from Josephus.
Reply by anderestimme on 2014-01-15 10:29:36
"But mothers pass on egg cells to their daughters without the father’s 23 chromosomes, maintaining a genetic line of maternal descent."
I don't understand this. How, then, does a woman pass on her father's genetic traits?Reply by Meleti Vivlon on 2014-01-15 10:36:01
What "Anonymous Too" is referring to is Mitochondrial DNA. The father's traits are passed on through the female as well as the male child, but only mitochondrial DNA is passed on through the female, providing a means to trace back through all generations. This is taken from Wikipedia:
Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA or mDNA[2]) is the DNA located in organelles called mitochondria, structures within eukaryotic cells that convert chemical energy from food into a form that cells can use, adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Nearly all of the DNA present in eukaryotic cells can be found in the cell nucleus, and in plants, the chloroplast as well.
In humans, mitochondrial DNA can be assessed as the smallest chromosome coding for only 37 genes and containing only about 16,600 base pairs. Human mitochondrial DNA was the first significant part of the human genome to be sequenced. In most species, including humans, mtDNA is inherited solely from the mother.[3]
Reply by Anonymous Too on 2014-01-15 11:26:57
The mother's egg, when impregnated to create a female, saves copies of itself which it passes on as eggs in the ovary of the infant. Sperm in the male infant develops later at maturity, but the female eggs are fixed and formed from the beginning.
Another marvel of creation and pro-creation.Reply by Anonymous Too on 2014-01-15 13:48:21
The generation-to-generation changes in the egg-cell DNA (23 Chromosomes) is slightly and slowly modified by environmental influences. Although we deny evolution as a process, the changes in egg DNA from Eve to the three daughters-in-law of Noah account for the three branches of humanity. This is not the same as racial development, but for simplicity, we can call these three branches white, yellow and black.
Comment by GodsWordisTruth on 2014-01-13 23:48:03
When I was going over the reasoning book part I found it to be contradictory. In our response to householder we use Jesus' words at Matthew 7:21 to prove that not all Christians live up to that name. I've looked at this scripture differently since shedding the 144,000 doctrine . Jesus talked about the entering "the kingdom of the heavens" in this scripture ....not a earthly hope . We present the householder this scripture where Jesus speaks clearly of the heavenly hope but in the same breath tell the householder that their hope is on the earth referring them Ps. 37:10,11.
Why does our message in our preaching work different from Christ? Especially if we profess to follow Christ and take up the work he commisioned.In the reasoning book last week we said that door to door witnessing was a prequiste to identifying the true religion. What about preaching the only message that Jesus and his disciples preached?
Comment by Nick O on 2014-01-14 13:14:33
Comment for bible reading: At Genesis 6:9 we see that 1. Was a righteous man 2.Was faultless among people of his day. 3.Walked with the true God. He was obedient to God even without a written law, no doubt using Gods past dealings with humans to guide his conduct. This prevented him from being influenced by the wicked (Nephelim) of his day. Because of this he was able to enjoy a close relationship with God.
How can we benefit from his example? Christians today are no longer under the Mosaic law, but we can use God's dealings with humans in the past to help us to train our conscience and stand out as shining examples in the world today. How can we imitate Noah who walked with God? 1 Peter 2:21 says that Christ left us a model for us to follow his steps closely. No one is closer to the father than his son, so in walking in the footsteps of Christ we can continually draw closer to our heavenly father.
Comment by Edoyugbo patience on 2014-01-17 15:01:25
praise jah