₦airaland Forum

Fhemmmy:
Rabzy . . . .

Thanks for that great and touching story, but there is a difference in what you just narrated, i love the part where you said, your Mom tried to stop her . .
The case of those 5 years old kids, that is all they know and at least you Dad did all he could do to give you something and a life, but most other parents, just assume that they have given birth to those kids and they have done their job, and now the kids owe them, and it is not like that . . . .

I totally disagree with sending Kids this young to hawk on the streets, it serves no great material benefit, they would most likely lose most of the money they make on the way like i did a couple of times, or an adult would con them out of the money. That is why i said they might be making a delivering down the road to someone their parents know, in a village setting, all the villagers know the kids and the kids parents and they would most probably be selling to known people around the house.

You can hardly see a parent send kids that young to sell on the streets in a big city, the issue of 'gbomogbomo' was very common at least in lagos and mothers were always careful and scared. As a general rule younger kids accompany their older siblings at least to learn to the ropes and also for safety concerns. I grew up in places were almost all parents had to make their kids sell stuff for them, and i can honestly say that it is always like that, they don't just give birth and assume they have done their part and their kids owe them and so subject them to harsh child labor, for the most part its not like that, and some who did is not because they don't just love their kids, some are brought up that way too, some are immature parents and clueless about parenting, business and so become bitter towards everyone.

The general mentality and behavior is that, they have given birth to their kids, they have to help them to succeed in life, either thru school or business or a combination of everything and when the kids are older and successful, they would be now taken care of by their grown children. And in a culture where there are no special welfare programs for adults historically and by the stinking governments, then it is not a bad idea to have such an idea. In fact that is the only way our aged ones in the society have surviving.

I won't begrudge any parents that expects their mature and working children to take care of them.

armyofone:
Rabzy, your story is touching, God bless you.

my wish for our 21st century Nigeria is that pple have few kids, it make things a bit easier. looking at the pix on front page, i think the kids are likely to be age 5. so young to carry tray on their head and hawk.

There is little those kids can bring home to the family and they are way too young. But in our villages some these kids just carry those stuff to deliver to their mother's customers down the road or in the next street. I have not seen kids this small hawking in the streets of Lagos except accompanied by older siblings, and most times they just want to tag along and they cry if you don't take them. So their parents just put a miniature tray on their head ask them to follow their older siblings.

In some rural areas too, schools are so far away and ill-kept with no purpose in the teaching that it would equally be child abuse to send kids to such schools. In Nigeria the fact is, its not all school age kids that their parents can afford to send to school, its not all  kids that are interested in going to school and its not all places that schools are accessible.

i once had a family friend whose first son was always repeating classes and failing while his younger brother had passed him and was two years his senior. The father eventually asked him what he wants to do and the guy said he wants to be an 'eleran', a butcher. He dropped out of primary school and became a butcher. Before he graduated as a butcher or become independent, he had to hawk meat on the streets for his master, initially his master would be with him but later he was doing it himself. By the time he was 17, he was already an accomplished butcher. He could handle a cow and butcher it in minutes and that is what he lives on now. He already had a family long before i could think of talking to a girl.

Yeah, i believe we should all try as much as possible to reduce the number of kids we have. The government must have a policy of enlightenment and the campaign must be sustained. What shocks me most is that after seeing the struggle my parents did to raise us, my uncles also had numerous kids, the average was 7. My parents only had their standard 6 education, but all my uncles on both sides had more than that and they still were having 7, 8 kids.

Though they are not doing badly, their kids did not hawk like we did, they have built their own small house unlike us, but its a risk am not willing to take. Anything can happen in this country, there are no guarantees in this life. Just two days ago, i heard its like one of my uncles has been retrenched, in one of the airline servicing companies, though we have not confirmed it, he was their quality control manager and he was doing quite well financially, but what happens now and he still has little kids. Those ones can't even hawk if push comes to shove because they have lived a sheltered life.

Its wrong for the first child or the first kids to be working and taking care of their parents and also fending for the last ones. Its energy sapping and you can hardly plan your own life.

Outstrip:
GOd bless your mom rabzy. If you don't mind my asking what did your dad do after he lost his ob. You talk about wha your mom and siblings do but nothing about what yur father did

Most men are brittle materials, they can take shocks but they break suddenly without notice, most women are ductile, they keep on taking all the pressures, the weights, the loads, you see the signs of the stress all over them, they look older, their skins get pale, they get thinner and thinner and haggard, but they Hardly Break.

My dad was a blue collar worker, he worked for crown cork, one of their Bosses went away with their Udoji award, so he did not get his share, later they were retrenched. The money he saved up till then, he used it to buy a bus on higher purchase to use for interstate travels. In one of his Journey he had an accident - i was just some months old then - the bus was a wreck and he still had to pay back the loan. He was unemployed for many years and sometimes he gets to be a driver for one Oga or the other before he is sacked or it becomes more expensive to go work than to stay at home. He worked at different times as a driver to different people but the salary could not feed us nor pay our school fees.

As at 2004/2005 when we were like 4 kids in the University, he was earning 8000 naira driving one politician. That was the time i was selling all kinds of stuff in school and also doing holiday jobs. My younger brothers and sisters were also schooling and hawking at home.

Mothers are so tuned to surviving than fathers, they could do myriads of things to survive, while most men know just one or two ways and when those doors are closed, they are defeated, become cranky and sometimes become drunks.

There was a day my immediate elder sister came home from school, she just graduated from yabatech, as the second best student from her class and she just took my mom's wares and went hawking even though my mom tried to stop her. On the way she met one of her secondary school mates, a guy, who was also a prefect - she was the senior prefect and also finished with the best result - , the guy saw her and called her and they sat outside gisting about school, higher institution etc as if she came on a visit, the guy even bought her malt and after she finished, he helped her carry the stuff and she went on her way hawking. She was not embarassed, she was not ashamed, we still talk about those 'good' old days and laugh about it all.

But we are grateful we survived it all and we rode it mostly on our mother's back.

mightlove:
I learnt they sell sports equipment at thye stadium in surulere. i dont know which of them precisely, but they are close. I also know of sports world at the city mall, Onikan. Anyway, thosen that live in Lagos can tell you better. I never really had need to go gym equipment shopping when i was there so these are the only places i can tell you about.

Thanks Love, appreciate this. cheers

FEMARY:
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To hell with their statistics, if we dont need it we dont have to use it.

Hello Guys, sorry to badge into your logs, please where can i get exercise equipments to buy in Lagos. i have been to the shop at shoprite complex, am just thinking maybe i can get it a bit cheaper elsewhere.

Thanks.

I totally agree that these kids are way too small to be trading for their parents. But trading by Kids is not something bad in itself, it has been so for centuries in Africa, but the increasingly depraved world in which we live has made it more challenging for anyone including adults to engage in street trading.

We were seven in my Family and my dad lost his Job when we were still quite small, i started selling stuff for my mom when i was 8 and i don't go alone, i used to accompany my older sisters. My mom taught me how to read before i was 8 by the time i became 10, i was reading both English and Yoruba even though i am not a yoruba, i am the de-facto class reader for both languages. When i was 11 i was representing my primary school in the LGA competitions, so were my sisters and we were still hawking on the streets. I finished with the best result from my secondary school in the mid 90s and the same was true of my sisters.

I remember i bought my first wrist watch with the money i made from trading when i was just 12, it was not my mum's business, a friend of mine of the same age told me we could sell nylons bags to people that buys stuff at the near-by Agege Oju-irin market to put their wares and we would make twice the money we invested initially. Both of us went without our parents consent, thinking we were in the neighborhood playing, we would have gone to the market and within 10-30mins we have sold all our nylons and be back. i do this on days am not scheduled to hawk.
Even in the University i was selling computer accessories to augment my income from home.

Till today i thank my mom for helping us to pull thru all those difficult years, she never wanted such life for us, but circumstances forced us to, she showed us love and affection and gave us all a good moral upbringing. I can still remember all she did without screaming at us, without being harsh and always with a warm smile for all of us.

Our hawking to make our family survive, which we have done and done well was never child abuse. i pray my kids would never have to face all that or anyone's Kids for that matter, but if circumstances changes and we have to, then it is back to the trenches.

[quote author=must_a_far link=topic=741560.msg9008648#msg9008648 date=1314311055]Most of these things you listed are not about right or wrong. they are simply what the law says and most of the issues you have raised all boils down to the same thing. What the nigerian tax law says, whether capital gains tax, personal income tax, company tax, petroleum profit tax and the list goes on. hence at this point i'll like you to note that im not here to prove to you whether something is right or wrong. i'll simply explain what happened and led to the sitaution being what it is.

having established the above,

Going by what the PIT Law says and which i have stated a few times here already. because a potential tax payer does not work or earn income within the boundaries of nigeria doesnt mean that income is not liable to be taxed. actually it is not, it only becomes liable if he brings in a portion of it into nigeria. and the tax would only be due on the portion which was brought in. going by this, i would say it is right and lawful to request the someone you speak of to pay income tax because he must have earned such someway somehow and not necessarily thru paid employment.

the onus is on the tax payer/potential tax payer to prove he doesnt owe any taxes through filing. if he files and he proves he doesnt owe then he is cleared for that year and that would be reflected on his tax clearance card.

could you please state an instance where thugs were used to to extort money from people who dont owe them? but if i'll speak on this anyway, i'll say thats the distrain unit of the internal revenue service (whether lagos, delta, jigawa or federal) they are the ones who are allowed by law to have armed police officers accompany them when they go out to distrain (lockup) companies. they dont only go with police officers, they go with a camera crew who records how events unfold. let me state that the reason why a company would be distrained is if after several notices a company still fails to comply and prove that they remitted all PAYE withheld from their employees salaries to the relevant tax authority or the amount withheld and remitted tallies with the number of employees.

i really do not understand what your point is. but if i'll attempt to respond. i'll first state that, the taxes collected by all the different levels of government are parallel. local govts dont collect taxes, they collect levies, dues, and the likes. state governments collect mainly PIT in their domain, some CGT, etc and federal govt collects petroleum profit tax, company income tax, CGT for companies, PIT for the FCT, excise duty, import duty etc etc.


this might be a crude way of doing things but if after paying it is established that the taxpayer didnt owe in the first place or didnt owe as much as he had paid, the tax payer gets a rebate which he uses in the future to offset any tax that might be due to him then.

MVAA is a government agency, same as lastma, lawma, lasaa, lamata etc etc. for better working of govt, they share certain information amongst themselves and thus the source of the information the revenue agency used in issuing a best of judgement assessment (BOJ) on the individual that registers a car and but on further checking did not have any records of having paid income tax. you asked if one pays income tax on the price of a car. it is assumed that the money used in purchasing his car is his total taxable income.
hint: if he can prove that the money spent on buying the car was solely from his wife and the wife had paid taxes thru PAYE then he would be let off.



it was claimed that someone at the tax office said, the govt just randomly picks and slams them with a demand notice. they do not randomly pick, a demand notice would be sent to a potential taxpayer who registers a car but doesnt have any records of paying taxes previously. a demand notice would be sent if a taxpayer claimed to have made a certain amount of money as income from all sources. he was assessed tax based on that and late along the line he buys and registers a car hitting above his income level. e.g. mama tunji who is a trader declares a tradit profit of 200k for a tax period. she is taxed on the 200k then sometime afterwards she goes to register a car worth 1.5million she would be issued an upwardly revised assessment that would come in the form of a demand notice and would have to prove that the money used to purchase the car had previously been taxed.


with that i hope i have explained (i dont intend to convince you) the substance you have raised and how it relates to the tax laws of the Federal republic of nigeria. and if you feel the law is bullmanure, then we might as well all not complain about how our country has turned into a lawless country or better still we all do as we please in all departments.

thank you my brother/sister lastpage for having me. you have succeeded in keeping me awake this late while you sleep [/quote]if you did a business abroad and the income was paid into your account here, the it becomes taxable. But why should tax a CAR as income, it is property, just clothes, laptops, bags, jewellery, phone. So i don't agree that it is income brought in.
what if the car was a gift to mama tunji, its registered in her, would she be required by law to pay tax for that car or its just her business that the assessment should still be based on.
If the car was taxed this year, what if the car got spoilt or its had an accident, meaning 'income' has become less, would she still be taxed.

[quote author=BABE! link=topic=742795.msg8996646#msg8996646 date=1314196329]Technically, I'm not arguing with the fact that they said we are innovative. I'm simply sick of "them" ranking Nigeria. Wetin?

Again, who can't think of new ideas when thrown into a do or die situation? When poverty strikes, who wouldn't think of a way to survive? What's so special and "rankable" about being able to think of new ideas?

LOL @ the bolded clause. You're wrong Mr.  Your leaders are a special breed of thieves and evil humans. If Nigerians stop being "innovative" and start dropping dead one after the other (God forbid), do you really think those cursed f00ls we call leaders will care? You never jam![/quote]Oyinbos love ranking and they rank evrybody, and since we are in their face and are everywhere, they would always rank us, and more so, Nigerians are so diverse and ingenious that we always find ourselves in the ranking, Good, Bad, Ugly, Neat, Fashionable, Happy etc.

As per the bolded, am not thinking of us dropping dead, am just thinking of us getting so frustrated we start assasinating the very corrupt ones. If Igbinedion, Odili, Ibori, Oyinlola, Akala were found dead or their children murdered soon after they left office. Maybe they would start thinking.

I once argued with a group of guys, that our politicians are there for the picking, there is no security to protect them, all we need is a couple of assasins with high-precisioned velocity rifles and you drop off a couple of them across parties and across regions. Then you release a press statement that you would be monitoring others if they start building mansions, having car and opening businesses they can never dream of having from their monthly salary, then they would be killed and if they over-protect themselves, we will go after friends and family that they are using. If we do that consistently as group for a couple of years. Some change would take place.

Kajina:
Ricky_Ross, That is where you go wrong; you obviously lack knowledge in Ghanaian culture when it comes to respect for age. No body in Ghana in all our ethnic groups will call a person older than him/her only by their name. Even if you are the richest in your family and your older brother is the most useless man who does nothing good with his live, you still refer to him as brother so and so. And I believe this applies to most (if not all) Black Africans as well.

Now back to my chief and oga question, I asked this question because I have noticed always in Nollywood movies that the rich men such as the politicians etc. are always referred to as chief by their girlfriends, wives, and other lower class individuals, even though they are not chiefs? Another thing I have observed is that, a rich man’s house worker, like say, the gateman, always refers to him as Oga even though this gateman may be decades older than his Oga.  On the other hand, this rich man never calls his (older) gateman Oga. Even the rich man’s children also call the gateman only by his name without any Oga or brother. So although I will not argue with what you said, you should also see why based on the above, it’s fair for a person who has never been to Naija to conclude that in Nigeria you call your rich men chief or Oga.

By the way, I only responded to the part of the lyrics that says "which country in the world calls their friends “Charley”." Since culture is socially constructed, we all have cultures exclusively to our race, countries, ethnic groups, peer groups, etc, and there is nothing wrong about that, so please no vex on this one. Please don’t cast insults, it’s all fun.

To your information, Ghanaian children are really, really cultured. Obviously, you don’t know them that much to know what they are.

Culture differs and what is respectful here might be serious disrespect elsewhere, so its wrong to castigate anyone's culture. About your question, first i hate Nollywood or rather i hate the crappy stories and all the nonsense directing they do. So using nollywood as source of anything won't give you much.

Oga means Boss, so in the context it was used by girlfriends and gatemen, hosehelp it was right, so an older gateman must call his boss 'oga'. Most rich men are bosses, so they are rightly called 'oga'.

Then in the those films most of the rich men are chiefs and since it is a status symbol in the society, many rich men go to their village or anywhere where it is for sale and get a chieftaincy, but if i don't know you are a chief i wont call you a chief and even if i know i might refuse to call you chief. But often times you can call your friend or someone you want to draw its attention and you don't know his name 'chief' 'bros' as a sort of respect, but that is not the context i which it is used in those films.

In everyday life children of rich men especially in the west don't call their old gatemen by name they call them 'baba' even the owner of the house often call these men 'baba'.

[quote author=Kweku_double link=topic=743006.msg8996249#msg8996249 date=1314193423]Ricky_Ross, do i take it that you are just distorting the truth or that u want to create mischief??,  Do you genuinely believe yourself that the average ghanaian is more worried about nigeria than about his daily bread. Do you mean to tell me that upon all the numerous issues in ghana, we take delight trash-talking nigeria even to the extent that peace fm will spend valuable airtime talking about nigeria?
Dont tickle yourself my friend, the average ghanaian worries about inflation, the economy, education,jobs, etc, and peace fm doesnt do what you say. If you hear any radio station talking about 9ja, it means 9ja has made news, sometimes for good or bad reasons. OR somebody is trying to use an experience of 9ja to caution the authorities in ghana to take note and make sure same doesnt happen here(eg boko haram attacks) Ghanaians are not as silly as u r trying to make us look. I am quite sorry for your experience of ghana that has made you form such judgments but you cannot pollute the minds of fellow nairalanders about a whole nation just because of your experience with a couple of individuals.  
tacks) Ghanaians are not as silly as u r trying to make us look. I am quite sorry for your experience of ghana that has made you form such judgments but you cannot pollute the minds of fellow nairalanders about a whole nation just because of your experience with a couple of individuals.[/quote]I have been to ghana three times and there is hardly a time you would not read something bad about Nigerians or Nigeria in the Daily papers. Boko haram is a global news so its not surprising if it makes the news, but when very flimsy things are included in news items about us then you assume its just there to make us look bad and many people are joining the train. All you need to do is to say you are from Nigeria and before you venture far into your discussion, they start bringing up different trash about us.

There are a lot of Ghanaians in Nigeria and bad things also happen in Ghana but it does not make the news. Millions of Beninese (food, catering, fishing, textile business, househelps) Togolese (mainly construction industry) and Ghanaians, south Africans etc are here doing sundry of things legal and illegal, we don't feel threatened by them and we don't write bad things about them in the papers or about their country.

So

I don't really understand where Ghana got all this hate from and not just Ghana, so many African Countries, but Ghana's own takes the cake. I visited Ghana 2yrs ago and just for me to go and sample some roadside rice and chicken only for the girl selling the stuff to tell me she does not like Nigerians.

I had so many Ghanaian friends in Lagos when i was growing up, they were older than me with like 10-15 yrs, my dad took them like younger brothers, they taught me how to eat Ghana food, taught some folk songs in Ashanti etc, it was great fun. I have never seen anyone in Lagos dissing Ghanaians or for a whole community to take 'hating' as a national pastime.

We don't have time for all that crap and its time they do something better with their lives.

when they sent Nigerians out of Ghana, there were a whole lot of them especially Ogbomoso and Ibo guys, and they were not just shoemakers and hair dressers, they had businesses and houses which were taken over by Ghanians and we did not sing a hate song all that time, but they keep crying over the retaliation.
They even call those bags 'Ghana must Go' in Ghana, that is crazy, they don't ever want to forget.

[quote author=BABE! link=topic=742795.msg8992841#msg8992841 date=1314154940]They've started with their useless ranks again!   Silly survey! I'm sure the demographics and samples were biased.

What's the use of attaining high ranks when there's NOTHING to show for it?!  

I know some people are still gonna rejoice and bask in the so called "victory".  

Our president is handsome-- Has that lowered the price of kerosene in the  market?

Our Language(s) is/are sexy-- Who cares?

We are innovative -- Who cares about innovation? Who can't think of new ideas? Na innovation we won chop? EXECUTE and let's see na. mscheww.[/quote]When they Nigeria is one of the most corrupt, one of the dirtiest countries, one of the least-safe country, one of the most fraudulent, one of the worst of things in the world, we did not argue with them, because we know most of it are true even if exaggerated or not.
Now they have said we are one of the most innovative people in the world why should we argue with them, why should we castigate ourselves on that again, why should we not accept that we are indeed innovative.

We have learn t to be innovative to survive some of the worst conditions in the world, Home or away, Nigerians are known to be very innovative. Maybe that is why our leaders are taking us for granted, we are always looking for a way to survive and continue life.

I want to go on a raid for some of his best films. i remember his role as 'sergeant okoro'. please if anyone knows some of his best acts kindly list them here and where i can get them to buy in lagos.

Its very difficult to ascertain who really is unemployed in Nigeria, because of the very large people who work privately and at home.

I bought a car for my dad who is in his mid-sixties and has stopped working, the papers were in his name. He was apprehended by Kai officials in and was taken to their PWD branch. After we have resolved the issue with KAI, the Lagos state official there said before we take the car away we have to show evidence of having paid tax for three years which my dad does not have. Alternately she just taxed him a total of about 18k for three years which is the minimum he can pay.

All my explanations fell on deaf ears, i showed her my own tax card and all, but she said its not my name that is on the vehicle. She told us to go to a tax office and do an evaluation for my dad so that they can determine how much he would be paying or whether he would be exempted. We have not bothered to do that yet.

We sold the car and bought another one for him in my name.

[quote author=aloy-emeka link=topic=736350.msg8934142#msg8934142 date=1313490743]In America, the immigration service are not permitted to raid a catholic church. Once an illegal immigrant takes sanctuary in the church, they back off and can only be removed from the church under special circumstances which may involve the Vatican. That is why many illegals take sanctuary in the catholic church under duress.So, what's the big deal here?.[/quote]And while you are waiting for the Vatican, the guy is robbing and ra.ping everyone in the church, this is one of the most dumbest ideas ever thot of.

[quote author=Negro_Ntns link=topic=729479.msg8915195#msg8915195 date=1313245237]<quote>

odumchi:
Man what's your problem? How many times have I told you to leave Aro people and Igbo people alone for that matter? What is your problem really? I can't go on, reading your posts really piss me off. Keep your mouth out of topics you don't know about

</quote>

My presence here is to state what is truthful, if that makes you uncomfortable then great!


Ibo people are nobody in Nigeria when we talk about great people and cultures. To create a new greatness you all are on internet revising yur history. Where you find it impossible to revise yours you then try to revise other people's to narrow the obvious backwardness of your Nri/Aro history.

If we were doing a count and a nemurical value of 1 is assigned to each head of a Yoruba person, the Ibo equivalent will be 1/4 or less.

So you need to realize that you have oyibo to thank for designating you majority. You are truly and factually a political minority in this country. It has nothing to do with your population , which is not that many to begin with, but your political contribution to the history of Africa generally is blank![/quote]Am not sure i have seen a crazier ranting than this anywhere in this site, this is totally uncalled for and ignominiously and embarrassingly false. Guy try chill small.

Whatever any one eats is left to him, so far no be human meat. But what the guy wants is for someone to help him identify the animal because it has 3 hearts. It might be a rare or an unknown animal. It would have been better if there was a picture of the thing before they roasted it.

Me i don chop plenty too o, i think the most exotic i have eaten is shark and octopus.

The Edos are actually Japanese and were once ruled by a yoruba man called shogun,

We are the human race and there would always be similarities in culture, languages, food etc. The Ashanti numbers is similar to the Edo alphabets, Some words in Ebira are very similar to words in Esan etc. It shows we are from one stock and we all kept separating and diverging thru the millenniums. Am sure there would be some wolof, mende, gan, words that sounds similar to yoruba, hausa Edo etc.

We should be proud of where we came from but we are no better than any other race or tribe.

Please anybody wey sabi that number 10 Ajagun wey dey play our corner kick or person wey sabi d coach, make dem tell am say all those en corner kicks are rubbish.

Corners are very dangerous and the guy just wasted almost all of them. They are suppose to drop into the middle of the box and the corners should have some speed, its the speed with which the corner is taken that gives momentum to the ball when you nod it in.


All those looping balls wey en dey cross no make sense at all.

Osama10:
Thin blue line: The Metropolitan Police has been criticised for not having enough officers on the street

For these kinds of protest and mass madness, the police can never be enuf, you need to make an example out of a few and then the chicken hearted, copycats and cowards would run home, then you deal with the hard-core decisively.

My Father's favorite insult for us when we were growing up was:

Ekhun agbon ekhun elimi,

The sierra leone pidgin does not sound complete, its very broken and it does not flow like the Nigerian pidgin. But seriously the pidgin in salone is now a local language

^^^^
We have taken this thread totally off its original discussion, so i would say we should rest the case here. I certainly appreciate your viewpoint and its okay if you don accept this but let me reply some the things you cited above.

Fact: God said blood is sacred and should not be handled like every other body parts. Blood fractions came thousands of years later.
Fact: Disobeying the law incurs death, so anyone has a choice to disobey and incur wrath or beg for a possible forgiveness.

Saul's men did violate God’s law on blood, but they may have been shown mercy because they had respect for blood, even though they should have been more diligent about showing such respect.
Consider the situation. The Israelites under King Saul and his son Jonathan were at war with the Philistines. At a point when the men of Israel themselves were hard pressed in battle, Saul rashly took an oath that his men should not eat until the enemy was defeated. (1 Samuel 14:24)
His men were winning a hard-fought battle, but the strenuous effort was taking its toll. They were famished and exhausted. What did they do in that extreme situation? “The people began darting greedily at the spoil and taking sheep and cattle and calves and slaughtering them on the earth, and the people fell to eating along with the blood.”—1 Samuel 14:32.

They slaughtered the animal as requested by law but they somehow were also eating the blood along with it, probably by not draining it well, or while slaughtering them on the ground and cutting the meat they were falling into pools of blood left from the slaughtering.

Saul got to hear about it and ordered a stop and the procedure of slaughtering was changed and properly monitored, its clear that the intent of the soldiers was not to consume blood, so they did not sin deliberately, and when they do so inadvertently, they were not excused, they had to stop and everybody was made to comply with God's law regardless of their state of hunger or exhaustion.
The circumstances which was caused by Saul's rash oath, the fact that it was not their intention to, and lastly the fact that they stopped taking it, may have made God let them off. Also the verse said Saul made an altar, altars were used for sacrifices, what sacrifice would probably have been done at that critical time. Based on the context, i would say its a sacrifice for forgiveness.

The Blood is an organ, but it was the only organ God prohibited us from eating, so the issue of organ transplant has no bearing here. Organ transplant are not specifically mentioned in the scriptures nor was it prohibited. So any one who needs to can get an organ transplant.

Like i said modern science has thrown up both synthetic, natural and otherwise components, for some people the blood has been broken down so much that they don't see it as blood any longer and they feel their conscience can permit them to take it, well that is left to their conscience and if it does not condemn them then it is okay, and if some others don't want to touch any product from blood, then it is also a matter of conscience neither side should see the other as having done wrong.

As to the number of occurrence of it in the scriptures, the Bible and also normally when you are admonishing someone to adhere to rules, while you have a body or rules or laws, but you repeatedly mention some more often because of its level of occurrence. The bible condemned gambling, inquiring of the dead etc but they appeared less often than fornication, adultery etc. So if eating of blood, gambling, materialism and some other sins were not a major source of temptation for these early Christians, or for some particular group of xtians e.g Corinth Xtians or Thessalonians, then the Bible writer would not harp on it as much as the prevailing sins. We do the same with our children too, you help them, warn them or beat them on the things they do bad most often, a child that steals hear a lot more about stealing sermons than others.

Our magazines have not been scaring people about blood, we have written about the dangers of high/low blood pressure, smoking, the dangers of abortion even if the risk is reducing, the dangers of exposing yourself to the sun, the dangers of surgery, anesthesia, drinking etc. Even if the risk of abortion or blood transfusion becomes zero, it would still not be acceptable so far it violates God's law.

There has also been an increase in the number of people opting for alternatives to blood transfusions, more and more doctors are considering in situations were they would previously not have considered it. How many blood banks and doctors who prefer blood transfusions have written about that side of the story too. So enlightening ourselves about the alternatives and helping doctors and hospitals know about them is the way forward for us. Let others preach safe-abortion, safe-sex instead of abstinence, safe blood transfusion etc we can not join them regardless of medical break-thru because we would be violating our Bible trained conscience.

In the matter of vaccinations, this is a reply to a reader as far back as 1952

Is vaccination a violation of God’s law forbidding the taking of blood into the system?—G. C., North Carolina.
The matter of vaccination is one for the individual that has to face it to decide for himself. Each individual has to take the consequences for whatever position and action he takes toward a case of compulsory vaccination, doing so according to his own conscience and his appreciation of what is for good health and the interests of advancing God’s work. And our Society cannot afford to be drawn into the affair legally or take the responsibility for the way the case turns out.
After consideration of the matter, it does not appear to us to be in violation of the everlasting covenant made with Noah, as set down in Genesis 9:4, nor contrary to God’s related commandment at Leviticus 17:10-14. Most certainly it cannot reasonably or Scripturally be argued and proved that, by being vaccinated, the inoculated person is either eating or drinking blood and consuming it as food or receiving a blood transfusion. Vaccination does not bear any relationship to or any likeness to the intermarriage of angelic “sons of God” with the daughters of men, as described in Genesis 6:1-4. Neither can it be put in the same class as described at Leviticus 18:23, 24, which forbids the mingling of humans with animals. It has nothing to do with sex relations.
Hence all objection to vaccination on Scriptural grounds seems to be lacking. The only proper objection that some persons could raise to it would be on the matter of the health risks involved or of keeping their blood stream clean from diseased matter coming from a foreign source, whether from an animal sore or from a human sore. Medical science, in fact, claims that vaccination actually results in building up the vitality of the blood to resist the disease against which the person is inoculated. But, of course, that is a question for each individual concerned to decide for himself and as he sees it to be Jehovah’s will for him.
We merely offer the above information on request, but can assume no responsibility for the decision and course the reader may take.

Sometimes as medical advances take place it can affect our stand on matters e.g if respected health organizations and scientist says that marijuana is addictive, harmful and risky and we have taken a stand based on this, then some decades later they came out later and said they have used doctored report, they were wrong and all the dangers were false, this would make us re-think our stand on it based on Bible principles, if it is true that marijuana is not addictive, harmful etc then what would be the scriptural grounds for not taking it? So more lights and understanding of medical materials, procedures etc do affect our stand on matters.
We have never said our teaching is infallible or we have not been wrong on some matters, But for us God's word is Infallible and we strive to live by it as much as we understand it and we keep on studying it so that we can know more and get to know God better. So if adjustment is needed we are not ashamed to make it and if we have convinced of something or see no need for make any adjustment we are not scared to stick by it.

Maybe if other Christians even leave these deeper things of the scriptures and steer clear of clearer ones like eschewing Pagan holidays, stop glorifying materialism, stop making their pastors demi-gods, stop telling people tithes is an obligation and a must for Christians, stop killing their fellow Xtians in political wars, then they would have done so much to aid Christianity and the truth.

MRbrownJAY:
so what you are actually saying is that concubines and mistresses were allowed BUT that they didnt have the same rights as wives?!
yes, having ONE wife only was the "norm" but there was surely nothing wrong with a worthy man of having either multiple wives or mistresses.

here is something for you to consider from the mouth of Jesus himself:
Matthew 5:17-18 "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law (aka the Old Testament) or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke or a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law (aka the Old Testament) until everything is accomplished."

from this 2 verses we can clearly understand that what YOU are claiming is a product of your imagination!

Well let me start by saying the law was for the Jews, and Jesus christ was a Jew so he was under the law, but the law remained in force all the while until Jesus death and that is how Jesus fulfilled or accomplished the law after which Christians are no longer under the law of Moses but under the law of Christ thru the new covenant.

On the issue of God permitting some things but Jesus coming to correct them see the scriptures below: Matthew 19:8&9

8He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way. 9“And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”

So from the above you can not sleep with another woman when you are legally married with one, and you can not marry another legally except the one you have commits adultery and was subsequently divorced.

There was no provision nor permission of Concubinage in the christian ethics and laws.

There were some things that were permitted by God, not because he wants it that way, but he simply allowed it for some time, but when Jesus came he made it cleared that was not the way it was meant to be and so it is vey wrong for christians, all those David, Solomon examples don't appy.

MRbrownJAY:
^^the question has never been if it was IDEAL or not BUT IS IT A SIN OR NOT?!
let each and everyone decide what is ideal for them.

as for my claim, i repeat:"many in biblical times had multiple mistresses and GOD never looked down on them or call them sinners" so if its ok for them then it sure is ok for US ALL!

Among the Hebrews a concubine occupied a position in the nature of a secondary wife and was sometimes spoken of as a wife. It appears that concubines were slave girls, one of three kinds: (1) a Hebrew girl sold by her father (Ex 21:7-9), (2) a foreign slave girl purchased, or (3) a foreign girl captured in warfare (De 21:10-14). Some were the slave girls or handmaids of the free wife, as in the cases of Sarah, Leah, and Rachel.—Ge 16:3, 4; 30:3-13; Jg 8:31; 9:18.
Concubinage was in existence before the Law covenant and was recognized and regulated by the Law, which protected the rights of both wives and concubines. (Ex 21:7-11; De 21:14-17) Concubines did not have all the rights in the household that the regular wife had, and a man might have a plurality of wives along with concubines. (1Ki 11:3; 2Ch 11:21) In cases where the wife was barren, she sometimes gave her handmaid to the husband as a concubine, and the child born of the concubine would then be considered as the child of the free wife, her mistress. (Ge 16:2; 30:3) Sons of concubines were legitimate and could inherit.—Ge 49:16-21

So concubines were not just girls they see and just have sex, they were more or less wives with a secondary status, there must be a sort of handover or something to show that you have the legal right to have her.

I will be going to - mo ma lo si
I am going to- mo un lo si/mon lo si

MyJoe:
That's the problem. I for one am not absolutely sure this is God's law. When courts interpret laws they try read the mind of the lawmaker. There is simply no reason to think the writers of the Bible had the use of blood to save lives in mind when they wrote what they did. Your church certainly isn't sure what God's law absolutely is on the matter, either, considering the way they keep changing their mind on it. When the Bible is not clear on something, particularly a life and death matter like this, should Christians speculate?

What is the mind of the lawmaker on this issue, The lawmaker has told us that Blood is sacred, he told our forefather Noah that he may eat flesh, but the blood was prohibited. Blood was equated with Life by the lawgiver and anyone violating it in ancient Israel was liable to death.
So if disobeying the law would incurs death, then do you think if it would be lawful to take it to possibly preserve life.
Saul's soldiers that were eating meat along with its blood because they were almost dieing of hunger and could not wait for the animals to be bled were not excused.
The real issue is that the Christian prohibition was to "abstain from blood" (Ac.15:20,29). It required a complete unqualified "abstention from blood" with no stated verb saying "Don't EAT" or "Don't DRINK," ''Don't transfuse''. They simply must "keep away" from it (Ac.21:25)
The ancient Romans used blood sausages in their meals, some tribes use blood to seal treaties and some people take the fresh blood of guilty criminals to cure their epilepsy, these were practices that Tertulian an early christian said was unlawful for Christians, Even on the pain of death.

Medical science has come up with different variants and sub-components of blood or blood derivatives that it was necessary to consider if it was lawful to take them or not and they have tried as much as possible to guide us thru using bible principles. And even a lot of these guidelines has been left to the conscience of each individual, as to based on their study of the scriptures does their conscience approve or judge them, this was based on the principle of conscience explained by paul when he was talking about whether it was lawful to eat meat sacrificed to idols or not.

On the issue of Blood transfusion the Bible is very clear on that, but on fractions and other components, that is where revisions have happened on further understanding of such fractions, and even a lot is left to each individuals conscience and no one is condemned about this.

Ekpoma1:
Coward. Type what i can understand.

If you are ekpoma1, i assume you understand the languange and that is Ekpoma's esan and what i said is, you had better go and find something to do, while people are discussing important stuffs, you are saying thrash.

Ai ji me ru nu je e.