Talk:Gender of God/Archive 4

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Clarifying terms: Gender of God

I've restored what the Oxford Dictionary says about the Gender of God. Together with other canonical sources explaining foundational issues helpful to readers interested in the topic. Additional material and any alternative views are always welcome of course, especially since I'm unaware of there being any of the latter or I'd have sourced them by now.

In case there is any doubt, the text restored is sourced on the Oxford and on John Money et al. It is not sourced on Alastair Haines, who is a wiki editor, hence a servant of sources and readers not a source himself. I'm hoping the poor text will be allowed to fend for itself, rather than being damned by association with its restorer. Sometimes I wonder if I'm in love with the Oxford, the way I fight for her right to speak and share her wisdom with Wiki readers. Please be gentle with her.

If anyone finds the text hard to understand, feel free to ask here. Alastair Haines (talk) 02:07, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

WP is not a dictionary and, as has been said many times before, this text does not improve the article or help the reader; it has no great relevance to this article and should not be put back unless consensus is reached for its inclusion. Abtract (talk) 09:42, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. This is just needless repetition of material that exists elsewhere. Alastair, why not have a section defining of while you're at it? Ilkali (talk) 12:26, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

WP is not a dictionary is no argument against citation from dictionaries, as many articles demonstrate.

The talk page shows even editors (including the objectors above) have not understood the meanings of God, god or gender. Clarifying these is part of the article because it aids readers in a very direct, clear, reliable and neutral way.

The material is not all covered elsewhere, and where it is, that fact is irrelevant. It is foundational material here.

The final comment is a personal slight. Helpful only in demonstrating the nature of the purported objection.

The objections raised against the established section of the article have never gained consensus.

In fact, Ilkali previously ceased removing this section when Tim/Skywriter pointed out how silly the objection looked.

The brief statements of objection above do not engage with specifics of the section, the article text or the topic of the article generally.

They certainly don't make any reasoned case or argument.

For all a passer by could tell, they could have been written by someone who had read neither the text itself, nor sources on the topic.

Hence, we have no consensus for deletion. Alastair Haines (talk) 05:09, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

I am ambivalent to the language being added or deleted. As I review the language I am not sure its presence produces any different understanding for a reader than would already exists in an average reader. On the other hand, sometimes it is necessary to have a "belt and suspenders" method to produce understanding. Do you really think that readers don't have an understanding of the term God or gender? --^StormRider 07:53, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

The Oxford's comment regarding Gothic usage of God is very fortunate. It is useful twice over. How do we know the Holy Spirit is masculine? Well, believers may follow their church tradition, however, that does not satisfy readers outside the tradition. Some want to know why the church believes. A standard argument in the history of the church has been grammatical inconsistency in the Greek regarding the Holy Spirit. People at this page have argued this is just a Christian bias. But when the Oxford shows that in Gothic, the same grammatical argument can be applied, it helps people realise it is not religious nuts making up clever sounding stories.

Additionally, editors have been confused because they think the article is about God's sex, rather than his gender. He is spirit and can have no sex, they have argued. That's absolutely true. But gender is not a matter of biological sex, but of sociological gender. Hence, Father is a description of gender, not of sex.

I added the section because I had wrongly assumed that everyone understood these things, but learned quickly from other editors here that there are intelligent people who do not understand them. Just because you and I understand something, does not mean that he and she do. If you see what I mean. Alastair Haines (talk) 10:51, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

There may be room for dispelling the more prevalent misunderstandings (for example, clarifying the difference between sex and gender), but the sections in question go way beyond this. For example:

Gender is also an idea that has been been progressively disambiguated in the field of sexology by John Money, and in cultural anthropology by Donald Brown

Why are those names even there, in what is supposed to be a summary? It reads like someone trying to prove how much he knows by dropping in as much tertiary information as possible (even though that's probably not the spirit in which it was written). And:

those aspects of gender roles which are universal across cultures, like masculine generative, providing and protecting roles and their consequent authority [...], also the feminine maternal and nurturing roles, all of which are frequently observed by scholars of comparative religion

The concepts expressed here are somewhat relevant, but again, it's gone beyond just definition of terms. The section on god/God is even worse, with whole paragraphs being dedicated to etymology that, with the exception of perhaps a single sentence's worth of material, seems completely off-topic. Again, it screams at me "Look how much I know about etymology!" and not "Here is some useful information for you". Ilkali (talk) 12:28, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for this very direct and clear criticism. It is a lot easier to respond to than in some other cases (but don't worry about that). I find the acknowledgement that there is at least something worthwhile eases the communication and suggests the possibility of eventually finding common ground. I also appreciate that you acknowledge that it is only your perception that it comes across to you as "pretentious twaddle" (my paraphrase, no offense taken). When said like that I can grin and say, "Yeah! It does look like that, I can see exactly what you mean." I had a bunch of reasons for saying what I said, ultimately I don't care how things are said, I only care what is said. There is information there that I have reason to believe will aid readers. Reword the things to kingdom come for all I care, but take away the ideas and it's like pulling cards out of a card castle.

Anyway, now I really think we're talking. I've got to sleep right now, but when I get back, I'll talk through each sentence to explain why I think they are important. Feel free to object, and, for that matter, keep up the "sounds pretentious" stuff. That's a superb reason to copy-edit. If you think it sounds that way, so might others. I don't want people distracted by such things while delivering information for them.

This could be a perfect team, my increadibly deep and ridiculous fascination with arcane trivia, just might be able to be translated by a highly capable chap like yourself into text that a reader can really use. You haven't said it, but others have, I can sometimes speak English that no English speaker can understand. It hurts when people assume it's nonsense (or show-offy-ness for that matter), sometimes I just need someone to help interpret.

Enough said for now, but I think I'm going to sleep well because your post above seems really helpful. See you tomorrow Ilkali. Alastair Haines (talk) 11:28, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Hey Ho! Someone deposited a source at another article and I thought it might help the odd passer by here. ;)

"The problem is that the word god or God simply does not mean the same thing to all people who use it; and, what is more, most people in Western culture today, when they use the word, do not have in mind what mainstream, well-thought-out Christianity has meant by it." — N. T. Wright, The Challenge of Jesus, (InterVarsity Press, 1999), 96.

Alastair Haines (talk) 14:12, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Clarifying terms

The following explains in detail the relevance of the Clarifying terms section. With regard to the word god and several other issues that have been discussed at this page, the OED material is a reliable and neutral source that settles questions of fact and other disagreements.

• The first definition of god provided by the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is "A superhuman person (regarded as masculine)".

On the face of it, the OED answers the topic of the article in a single sentence. But the OED ultimately only presents one POV, in fact, a traditional English language POV influenced by broadly Christian ideas. Additionally it gives us an example of the use of "person" in reference to gods—persons have gender, bodies have sex, the two are not identical, and conventions of language use exist here. It does not choose to say "A superhuman entity (regarded as male)" which suggests more the animal than the divine.

• It goes on to note that, "when applied to the One Supreme Being, this sense becomes more or less modified",

This quote is important because even the Oxford admits that the meaning of the word god is a blurry topic. It also demonstrates that even in a generic reference—"One Supreme Being"—capitalisation is a normal convention.

• and also that, "Even when applied to the objects of polytheistic worship, the word has often a colouring derived from Christian associations.

Here we discover that natural language is influenced by religious thought, and that even one religion may overide others in the perception of natural language speakers. We also learn that polytheism and monotheism become blurred in English language usage. These are things the article really needs to address if we are to cover the topic of the title of the article.

• As the use of God as a proper name has throughout the literary period of English been the predominant one."

There has been discussion as to whether or where god is used as a proper name in the article and what convention should be used. Wiki MoS sensibly simply follows what the Oxford notes here. Use of God is most often (but not always) a proper name in English.

• Thus, English language usage of god and God vary sufficiently widely for the OED to note the variation,

This sentence merely avoids being a quote farm by making the relevance of the quote clear. The word god is blurry in English. We need to use additional sources to clarify its meaning in whatever context we're working. That explains to a reader why we need to look at how religions think about God or gods.

• and to use the imprecise phrases "more or less modified" for God, and "often a colouring" for god.

This notes that the Oxford is extraordinarily vague in the god entry. It cannot even specify what the boundaries are on the different senses of the word. We need to look elsewhere.

• The etymology of the word is given by the OED as Proto Indo-European (PIE),

The word god is thought by experts to go back to a time before we even have records.

• from either the verbal roots for to invoke or to pour (libation or blood in sacrifice).

I don't care less what the word god originally meant, but this detail gives the reader something concrete to imagine. 4,000 years ago people made sacrifices, and named the things they made sacrifices to after their word for sacrifice.

• It enters modern English not via Greek or Latin, but via Gothic guþ and Old Norse (ON) goð,

Proto Indo-European words travel all over the place in Europe, most people are familiar with Greek and Latin coming into English, but the "core" of English actually comes from Germanic languages—a different branch. Latin for God is deus, Greek is theos, but the English word is Germanic. Big deal you might say, but we can actually be super-concrete now, because we even have a picture of what the word looked like 1500 years ago. That gives a reader the chance to know we are moving beyond theory to well documented facts. The grammar of these languages then becomes significant.

• in which "the words always follow the neuter declension, though when used in the Christian sense they are syntactically masc[uline]."

Grammar was changed or broken depending on whether you are a prescriptivist or not. The Gothic language changed because people broadly accepted some Christian teachings about God. In particular, teachings about his gender. Would they change a neuter word to masculine unless they thought Christianity had a masculine God?

• Old High German (OHG) shows the same pattern of neuter plurals but masculine singulars,

This is almost redundant, except it is actually a second line of evidence, also it shows the tendency was either retained during language evolution, or it was reinvented. It slightly rephrases the preceding quote, in a more concise way, and avoids merely presenting a quote farm.

• "the adoption of the masculine concord being presumably due to the Christian use of the word."

This prase clarifies cause and effect more explicitly. Christian use causes secular use, not vice versa, a point on which Jeffro continues to argue against the OED. Good for him. Sources are often wrong, but we can only say so if another source has documented that.

I have not 'argued against the OED' at all. The etymology of some words has been influenced by Christianity or branches thereof, and I have never disputed that. The word 'God' (as distinct from 'god') has long been in contemporary usage, and the OED merely presents that particular development. It is in fact unclear why you have said I argued anything at all here. On this topic, I previously stated: "I had not intentionally used lower case to present any specific theological viewpoint. ... Strictly speaking, 'son of God' is the correct usage in the article - 'God' functions as a proper noun". I do dispute the necessity to capitalize 'son' in the phrase 'son of God', though 'Son of God' is appropriate if it is being used as a title (a proper noun).

What I have argued against is the presumption that doctrines post-dating the development of Christianity are preferred by some for determining which religions are Christian.--Jeffro77 (talk) 01:14, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

• The OED further suggests, "The neuter [substantive], in its original heathen use, would answer rather to [Latin] numen than to [Latin] deus."

Here we get information that must be added to the article eventually. There is much discussion of the "numenous" in the literature of comparative religion and in some kinds of theology. It is conceptually related to where personhood ends and nebulous spirituality of some other kind takes over. Some PsOV suggest God is so spiritual as to transcend gender. We all know he is supposed to transcend a body and so a sex, but can he transcend gender without losing personhood? There is inadequate treatment of this topic in the article to this date. There is enough to show that several major PsOV differ on precisely the point, however.

• Further disambiguation of the concepts subsumed by the modern English word in the title of this article becomes apparent as the OED notes "an approximate equivalent" to deus in ON and OHG survived into Old English as ōs.

This matters, because it brings us to our own language of English in a previous incarnation. Old English had two words for god, where we only have one. One reason English language is blurry about God is because we now only have one word when we used to have two.

• However, this was only applied to "higher deities of the native pantheon, never to foreign gods; and it never came into Christian use."

This helps us see that there was a time (Old English), where the Gender of Goth and the Gender of Osses would neatly separate monotheism and polytheism, but in modern English this is a matter of disambiguation, because two words have become one.

Essentially, the God section of Clarifying terms is a painfully short, concise to the point of incomprehsibility, vital part of the article needing expansion, not deletion. Jeffro wants secular material on divine persons and there's tons of it. That's where I've been advocating we start for some time. Comparative religion is the NPOV branch of scholarship that seeks to stand outside religions and compare them. The Christian view of most scholars of comparative religion is that they are heretics. I think they frequently speak a lot of pretentious twaddle, but that's what they say, and it we need to document it. It does contain a lot of clarity along with some dated speculations. It would help a lot if people remembered I'm only trying to reflect what sources say, I frequently disagree with both what they say and how they say it. But we are editors here, not authors. We have tons of room to rephrase sources and to be selective about the actual content we extract from them.

I'll explain the reasoning behind the Gender section later. Alastair Haines (talk) 23:36, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Do you mind if I insert responses into your comment? You've addressed this in a structured, point-by-point way and I'd like to do the same, but it'd be difficult to follow the flow of conversation if I put all my responses down here.

Meanwhile, and before we start, I'm hoping you can confirm that you recognise where I'm coming from. We can agree, I think, that there is enough knowledge on gender within religion to make this article colossal - thousands of pages of sourced text. But we know we can't and shouldn't do that, because it would defy what Wikipedia is supposed to be: a quick, accessible resource. We have to draw lines deciding which content should be included. The reason we're clashing is that there is no explicit guideline telling us where to draw those lines.

What I'm hoping you'll acknowledge is that this isn't a matter of policy or of sourcing, but of pure editorial opinion. We've all made judgements on this issue - you, me, Alynna, Abtract, Storm Rider. We've all decided where to place our lines. And on a grand scale, we all place them in roughly the same places - we're all implicitly rejecting over 99% of the sourced text that could be included. We're just disagreeing on a few hundredths of a percentile.

Ultimately, I'm happy to discuss the reasons behind my judgement and see if you can change my mind (or I yours) but there's a possibility that nothing will change. There needs to be a fair way of dealing with that eventuality. Ilkali (talk) 00:30, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

That's a very thoughtful and considerate approach Ilkali. While there are lots of things in what you say where I resonate with you, there are just two points where it's worth me differing slightly right now.

Firstly, interleafing point by point with my points above doesn't seem good to me. It will ultimately make very concise, uncontroversial and reliable material appear to be some big content question. Additionally, there is a fair bit of repetition in my points above (although I've tried to avoid that). These don't need repeated treatment, even if that is just to say "see above".

Secondly, the current article is brief and very lopsided with no organising principles. When we have ten screens of quality, sourced text, logically structured, then we can see about transforming it into a parent and relegating its sections to subpages. Until the whole picture is seen, material, especially sourced material should not be deleted. That's the only reason a whole bunch of trivial minority opinions are currently in the text. But, one thing at a time ...

It is much easier for you and for readers of any genuine discussion if there is thematic treatment of the sort of things I've pointed out above. I'll summarise them as a short list of statements I think are important. You can then explain why you think those facts are not important. I hope that's a convenient compromise. Alastair Haines (talk) 00:47, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

"Until the whole picture is seen, material, especially sourced material should not be deleted". Unless there is a policy or guideline stating precisely this (and defining "the whole picture" and how to identify it), this too is a matter of editorial opinion. I must insist that we move no further until we have agreed on a method for proceeding if, at the end of the discussion, our opinions still do not coincide. Ilkali (talk) 02:47, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Summary of facts derived from OED re God

• the word god has fuzzy meaning and usage in modern English
• by default it generally has masculine associations
• it includes presuppositions derived from Christianity
• there were two words in Old English, one for "high gods" of polytheism and the word that has survived mainly as refering to the Christian God.
• other languages distinguish between personal divinities and more numenous spirits that modern English translates indescriminately as god
• prior even to Old English, the inflection of the word was influenced to masculine syntactic agreement by Christianity
• ultimately the word is thought to have been associated with libations and sacrifices

That should do for now. Frankly, if you want to demonstrate that all of these are completely irrelevant to the article, I think you will find that a very long and difficult task, especially if you are attempting to gain a consensus for that. The best way to interleaf things is to discuss them one at a time. How about we do that? First question: how do you argue that the meaning of god is irrelevant for discussion, when the OED asserts it is ambiguous? Alastair Haines (talk) 01:04, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Pick our battles

We need to pick the battles here. The definition of gender and God are completely innocuous and the objections are not worthwhile battles.

Ideally we should have no battles, of course, but let's at least stick with something worthwhile. The definition does not harm the text. Please leave it and focus on ganging up on Christianity. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 06:06, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Hi Tim, that's an extremely clever and perceptive comment. Alastair Haines (talk) 11:01, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Once again Tim declares a disagreement unimportant while adamantly and unwaveringly supporting one side of it. If it doesn't matter enough to be worth discussion then drop it. Ilkali (talk) 12:13, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Proof Texting and Spoof Texting

Rather than wade through all the verbiage and sources, I'd like to point out the difference between proof texting and spoof texting. Proof texting deals with clarifying what the sources say. Spoof texting deals with burying the clear meaning under a mountain of sources that tangetally twist the mainstream take into something other than what it means.

Notice Storm's interesting quote: "only God that exists to worship."

Now, what does that mean? Does that mean that God is the only God, period -- monotheism; or does it mean that God is the only God they worship -- henotheistic polytheism?

The further quotes from Storm support the latter position.

I would appreciate it if Storm would stop trying to present Mormonism as Christianity and stop arguing for my supposed ignorance when his own spoof texts end up working against that proposition. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 17:40, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

This article clearly gives credence to the christian idea. If this "battle" is to be fought it should be at that article's talk page and not here in a backwater. Abtract (talk) 18:20, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Ah! Thank you for seconding my point. The issue here is whether Mormonism is identical to Christianity regarding its view of the gender of its God or gods. Deciding how many divine persons there are in Mormonism is part of that question, "battling" over whether Mormonism is "Christian" in some sense is, as you say, really not appropriate at this article. I believe Storm and Tim are aware of this, Abtract, nice of you to join us. Alastair Haines (talk) 22:32, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

OK, I got up off the floor from laughing. Typical response of this genre of "enlightened" fellow. Let me remind you that you have completely ignored any attempt to define Christianity during the time of Christ, or the time of the apostles, up to the time of the Nicene Creeds invention by men. I can understand why you would not want to provide a response because it would completely undermine your position of demanding that Christianity is limited to the Trinitarian doctrine.

I know that you dislike to answer questions, but with all of your knowledge, please inform readers what Gods Mormonism can choose from to worship? Please name them. When you can begin to answer questions, then there may be a discussion here, but all you have done is stand on your narrowly conceived soap box and spout your POV. Entertaining, but nothing that resembles enlightenment. --^StormRider 19:18, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

There you go again. Storm, you say that the Nicene Creed and Trinitarianism are the invention of men and NOT the first century belief of Christianity...

EXACTLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's different, in the view of Mormonism; and not different, in the view of Christianity. Once again, I'll even grant you that Mormonism is the only true Christianity -- but that makes mainstream Christianity NOT true Christianity, doesn't it?

My point has never been that you are wrong -- only different. To that, you continuously prove my point, while laughing on the floor at me at the same time. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 01:12, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

This is tiresome, because it is so POV and elementary. You paint Christianity in terms of black and white; you are adamant that Christianity only exists in one form without any deviation in doctrine. The alternative view, that of scholars and academics, is that Christianity has a varied history of doctrine, but all fall under the umbrella of Christianity. What you want to do is stand at the door, ignore references and historical fact, and demand that all editors comply with your narrow view. I am sorry, but that is the realm of a personal blog and not Wikipedia. Please try and understand this, Christianity is based upon the teachings of Jesus as the Son of God. 4th Century Christianity fits that definition as does Mormonism. The ONLY person attempting to exclude anyone is you and it is getting beyond silly. Alastair seems to have confidence in you, but I see all of your efforts as evidence that his trust is misplaced. Cheers. Oh, please stop vandalizing the article. --^StormRider 01:21, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Friends, I'm feeling Abtract is right, there is too much discussion of whether Mormonism is Christianity here after all. It need not be asserted nor denied in this article, it is simply irrelevant. All that is relevant is what mainstream churches believe about gender of divine persons.

If LDS churches are identical to other churches, they don't need to be in the article at all. If they have something to add, it is under LDS, not what is common to all groups who are known as Christian. The Christian heading should simply describe ground common to all groups uncontroversially known as Christian. Catholic, Protestant or LDS additions are by definition not common ground to Christians, and it is up to the reader to decide whether any such additions should be included in "full" Christianity or not.

It seems to me it is fair to say that Christianity (without naming denominations) has three divine persons, each of the three persons is considered masculine, these are considered to comprise one Godhead.

If LDS believe this and only this, we don't need them in the article at all, they are just Christians like anyone else who is not mentioned by name (Baptists, Pentacostals, and 30 something thousand other denominations). This is to say "Christians" only in the sense of holding to Christian views of God's gender, because nothing else is relevant in this article.

However, if LDS believe the Father is male rather than masculine, then they do have something unique to say, and possibly different to what other-for-the-sake-of-argument Christians say. For the Catholic view is that Father is masculine not male. That is to say, he is not physiologically male, but sociologically masculine. (A sourced point I note has been conveniently deleted from the article.)

Were LDS to consider the Father male as well as masculine, however; we could still, theoretically, classify them with Christians, since male-ness implies masculinity. But the point is moot because there is no need to say precisely who is included in the Christian section, we only need to name groups that have relevant additional views. These views may or may not be Christian. But whether they are or not is irrelevant to the topic. Alastair Haines (talk) 01:54, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Alastair, I like your approach.

Storm, my primary interest in this article is as Alastair pointed out: Mormonism does not have three divine persons in a singular deity who are masculine, rather than male. Mormonism has male, rather than masculine.

As for academics, I think your points are utterly ridiculous on the grounds that you ONLY regard someone as an academic if they are not Christian! Only secularists or Mormons can be academics, but no Christian seminaries or acadmics. If Christians are the ONLY people who are not allowed to define Christianity, then you are right by default -- but it is an astonishingly POV position. Much better would be to allow each group to define itself, and when there are conflicts, the largest self-definition wins. It's a simple method for every group there is.

Instead, you think that the only people who are NOT allowed to define a group is that group itself. That's utterly absurd. It would be like the Reorganized LDS defining LDS. They don't. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 02:17, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

While I think other articles would force Storm, Tim and I to have to face deep differences of opinion, I don't think there's any need for that in this article. It has a narrow scope that actually allows us to work together. The only thing impeding us is an article history whereby other editors have tried to assert Mormonism is Christian. Unless those other editors are willing to source a claim that this issue is relevant, I suggest we drop the sabre-rattling, for I find it more distressing than the literary skill of its execution can assauge. Alastair Haines (talk) 02:27, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I'd appreciate Tim and Storm explaining how my proposal below is unsatisfactory to them.

Tim:

Christianity

Catholicism

Minorities

Latter Day Saints

requires sourcing to exclude LDS from Xty

Storm:

Christianity

Catholicism

Minorities

Latter Day Saints

requires sourcing to include LDS in Xty

NPOV:

Christianity (Father+Son=Jesus+Spirit)

Catholicism (Father masculine NOT male)

Latter Day Saints (Father masculine AND male) [dodge the issue of glorified female believers becoming gods? include it without criticism?]

Feminine Holy Spirit

Gender ambiguous Creator and Holy Spirit

Jesus the Christ but not divine (how does this affect views of the gender of the Father)

The only reason to specify Catholicism here (which only says the same as what all but the gender neutral people say) is to help to avoid suggesting that LDS are not Christian. We could adequately cover Christianity without mentioning Catholicism, since Protestants and Catholics have no disagreements about God in regard to his gender. But we don't really need to isolate Catholics to assist with this, since the Feminine HS people and gender ambiguous creator people clearly include some Protestants. However, we are not clearly indicating that any of the groups are Christian either, since we extend treatment to include those who consider Jesus to be the Christ, but not divine (Jehovah's Witnesses, Christadelphians and so on).

Additionally, if there is any way you two can think of for me to help you two make progress, other than inviting me to take sides, I'll seriously consider your suggestions. A cup of tea perhaps? ;) Alastair Haines (talk) 04:24, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Alastair, I'm okay with lumping them all together as long as there is a rational name assigned to the superset. I think that we are all agreed that there are "Christianities" that are mutually exclusive. I think we are also all agreed that mainstream Christianity is Trinitarian. And, I think we are all agreed that Mormonism regards itself as NOT Trinitarian, BUT Christian. There are other "Christianities" -- Gnosticism (dualistic in many forms), Jehovah's Witnesses, Christadelphian, Christian Science, Moonies, Branch Davidians, etc. These range from full blown polytheism to radical monarchianism, and they anathematize each other. I'm okay with organizing them together as long as there is a rational name, or separate if we insist on the contested term "Christianity." Either one is fine. But certainly not a mixture of both, for the simple reason that Mormons and Christians do NOT regard each other as in the same religion. Mormons and Christians very actively try to convert each other, and with serious intent. But "Christian Related Beliefs" are perfectly acceptable to me. Even Mormons would grant that some of these Christian related beliefs are not what they would regard as Christians -- but they would agree that such groups are Christian related. Also, in this way Mormonism isn't singled out. Only we need be bothered with the fact that Mormonism is one of the groups that I regard as RELATED, while Storm regard orthodox Christianity as only RELATED. In fact, people would most naturally think that we are talking about the "other variations." That way Storm gets the organization he wants, and he can secretly smile at the idea that true Christianity is only RELATED (as an invention of man). It's as NPOV as can be, since no one will have any idea who is "related" while we do not deliberately further a falsehood that Mormons are Trinitarian -- which they are not. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 05:08, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Tim, you put a lot of words in the mouth of Mormons. Maybe you can provide some references. Who exactly does the LDS Church anathematize? When has the LDS Church ever declared another Christian church as being non-Christian? I strongly encourage you to limit your statements to what you know. Do not take it offensively, but you don't have a clue about what the LDS Church teaches or believes. In making statements similar to those above, you only create more problems. Tim, if you are saying above that we use self-definition to categorize churches, then there is no problem. However, if we are going to use what Catholics think of JWs and then categorize JWs based upon the majority Catholic position, then that is absurd. You are confusing apologetic writings, anti-cult writings, with a neutral dicussion of Christianity. This is not the article for such a discussion.

These types of segregations are simply not used within the LDS Church. You may be confusing a concept of truthfulness or the "one true church" in LDS doctrine. The Church does proclaim to be the one true church. However, this does not equate with a statement that other Christian churches, or even other religions for that matter, are without truth. The emphasis is on a fullness of truth found within the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. More importantly, the LDS Church teaches that all Christian churches and religions have truth within them and that God interacts with them. Personally, I outright reject any POV attempt to designate any Christian church as "Christian related beliefs". This only satisfies the need of some churches to claim other churches are less than themselves. "You are heretical," but "you are acceptable." I frankly don't understand the need for any other section title except Christianity for all groups within Christianity. The perspective of each church or denomination toward another church, denomination, or group within Christianity is irrelevant to the topic of this article.

What has been used in most articles of Wikipedia is the designation of "mainstream" Christianity; I think it can be used easily here. The main focus should be on the majority position of gender doctrine and then fleshed out with significant minority doctrinal positions. At some point a line may need to be drawn between a significant minority position and fringe. Branch Davidians would seem to be a fringe position, but maybe my facts are not accurate and they are a much larger group than I think. In fact, Messianic Jews number less than 300,000 if the figures I just reviewed are correct. If a group is a significant minority and also adds a diversity of doctrine, then the article should address their respective position. Does that make sense to you, Alastair?

I believe that Ikali and another editor have both challenged you to take any discussion about what is and what is not Christianity to the actual article where a top level discussion can be made...again. Wikipedia already has all the sources that declare what groups belong within Christianity and there is not need to recreate the wheel here. This article will follow what has already been decided by the majority. If anyone disagrees with that position, then I view it as a personal problem, but not one that needs to be belabored again on this page.

I like the section you have proposed above under NPOV for the most part. My personal preference is to reference the majority opinion, which is the Catholic position. Certainly, it would be acceptable to add references for other mainstream positions. I would not be too quick to make generalizations for all Catholics and Protestants; they are not uniform in doctrine and should be differentiated when applicable.

I would be curious to find out how respective churches view the resurrection and its application to gender. LDS teach that the resurrection is a complete, glorified restoration of the body, which includes male and female. The majority of mainstream churches teach the resurrection of the body, but is gender retained or is it absent? I have heard both positions taken at times. It appears that there is at least a thought of discussing what happens after this life. It does not directly apply to the topic, but if we are going to investigate the LDS position, there is not need to stop there. --^StormRider 08:12, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

If I hear it correctly, we have had progress, but there is a new, relevant, practical issue.

Not only that, in some ways, both Tim and Storm agree that they are not happy about "Christian related" as a name for the super-set.

Their reasons are not very different either. Tim feels RELATED is a "put-down" and so does Storm, just put-downs of different groups.

I think there are many others who would offer other reasons to agree with Tim and Storm.

Why use a more complicated word if a simpler one will do?

The funny thing is, the Oxford English Dictionary might indirectly solve the problem for us.

If the deleted section defining God is inspected, it speaks of "Christian" influence on "Gothic" usage for God.

I'm sure Tim can explain to people the significance of the OED describing the Gothic church as "Christian".

It's amazing what a good source can do to avoid arguments. ;) Alastair Haines (talk) 09:46, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Answers to Storm. Regarding addressing what the definitions and boundaries of Christianity are, Wikipedia is very clear that self-reference is not adequate. There many are excellent reason for that. One is that if a Wikipedia article contains information based on sources, those sources rather than the article are the authority. If, however, there is a "best guess" by vote at an existing article, a new article, if it goes to sources instead, helps "boot-strap" Wiki upwards.

In any case, I don't have time to research an answer to the bigger question, nor to negotiate the intricacies of progressing that discussion. Perhaps one day, but probably not. In an LDS article Christianity is the LDS churches, in a Roman Catholic article it is the RCC. That's a bit crude, and not quite right; but the point is that usage of a flexible and generic word like Christian needs to shift somewhat with context, in keeping with natural language. A "top-level" policy would be fiendishly complex, although general guidelines might be manageable.

Regarding referencing Catholicism as the majority voice in Christianity, I do that sort of thing frequently. Ratzinger's work with the CCC was outstanding. It has impressively clear and sourced description of standard Christian doctrines, as well as Catholic distinctives. When it comes to detailed Biblical interpretation, however, it is not uncommon to find that Protestants have done that work. But, once again, it is horses for courses, some topics divide Christians into clear groupings—Is Jesus divine? Others divide them into tiny pieces—what is the right way to organise church government? Some are doctrinal issues believed to have salvation implications, others are doctrinal but not so "sharp"—adult or infant baptism. You know the drill. ;) Alastair Haines (talk) 10:18, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Alastair, thanks for the point regarding the Arians. My latest edit organizes around Mainstream Trinitarians and Non-Trinitarians.

Storm, good point about the resurrection bodies. Since Mormons believe both men and women will become gods, the literal gender of those gods certainly plays a role in this article and should be addressed. Trinitarians and other monotheists wouldn't have thought of that, since neither Christianity nor Judaism has more than one deity. And we wouldn't have thought of the gender of the humans who are to be deified. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 06:53, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Tim, the way you describe the LDS position always clangs badly to the ear; it always is distorted. What other God does Mormonism have than Father, Son and Holy Ghost? I have asked this question before and I either missed the answer or it was not answered. If you are going to continue to make the allegation, please explain yourself. If you are not capable of answering the question, then please don't make the allegation. Is this fair? Also, when you use the term gods, you seem to equate it to the Father as if the Father is replaced. In Mormonism there will never be a time when He is not our God. We may be His children and through Christ may join in a unity with him, even to the point of Him calling us gods as he has multiple times in the Bible, but we this use of gods is not the same as being God. There is a distinction here that you seem not to understand. Am I wrong?

Does mainstream Christianity teach that when the resurrection occurs both men and women lose their gender? If they retain their gender, why? Though this may not be addressed, it is applicable and should be discussed. The theosis of Eastern Orthodoxy, and RCC for that matter, teach that humans will become gods; will these beings have gender?--^StormRider 16:22, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

To your questions -- what other god does Mormonism have than Father, Son and Holy Ghost. First, these are separate BEINGS to you. They may form some kind of corporation that you call "god" but from my reading of Mormon texts Elohim is the Father, while the Son is a similar but subordinate being even as you expect to be. If Jesus is God, he is a different god from Elohim. And since Mormonism teaches that men become gods and populate their own planets to be worshipped, there are as many potential gods in Mormonism as there are Mormons themselves.

The fact that you only WORSHIP Elohim is not the same thing as saying there are no other gods. To say "Elohim is OUR only god" is quite different from "Elohim is THE only God." The first may be either Henotheistic or Monotheistic, while the second (without modifications) is only Monotheistic. You continuously tag a modifier on there such as "Elohim is the only god Mormons have to worship."

To your second question about the resurrection and gender, there is no explicit conclusion. Jesus said they neither marry nor a given in marriage -- but that doesn't preclude GENDER. Most pastors and theologians speculate that the resurrection relationship of earthly spouses will be beyond sex, and that, while not the same as what they physically experience now, will be better. Other than Ben and Jerry's chocolate fudge brownie ice cream, however, I cannot imagine anything "better than sex" so I'll just have to wait and see.

Judaism doesn't really get into it (that I can find). Granted, I haven't done a thorough search and may need to do so.

But my main point was this: in Judaism and Christianity the gender of the resurrected favored is NOT applicable to any "gender of god"; while in Mormonism it absolutely is. As man is, God once was; as God is, man may become -- right? The pattern of the resurrection body is ABSOLUTELY applicable to an understanding of the gender of God, given this formula. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 16:55, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

"Regarding addressing what the definitions and boundaries of Christianity are, Wikipedia is very clear that self-reference is not adequate". I've already argued against this point, Alastair, and you did not reply. I'll avoid speaking on Storm Rider's behalf and simply reiterate what I wrote there: This is not a matter of saying that Christianity/Mormonism is X because article Y says so. The point is that there is a notational convention throughout Wikipedia; in all major articles on the subject, Mormonism is treated as a Christian denomination. So:

• Do you agree that there is an apparent wide-scale convention of this kind?
• Do you agree that such conventions are useful (for example, in that they permit us to avoid arguing about the same issues on every relevant page)?
• Do you agree that these conventions should therefore be followed by everyone, even if they don't agree with them?
• Do you agree that, if these conventions are to be changed, the proper approach is to address them directly at more central, high-traffic pages (such as at a WikiProject) rather than at small pages like this one?

Ilkali (talk) 17:32, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Language v doctrine

I think an issue that has the potential to cause confusion is the difference between ordinary language usage and precise doctrinal positions. When writing on religious topics, some words have generic ranges of meaning and wide currency in ordinary language usage. This is very important when considering the audience for which we are presenting our text. Our readers cannot be presumed to familiar with the specifics of particular religious groups and their doctrines. Words, like God, god, Christianity and many others take some of their meaning from context.

Doctrine works differently—religious groups typically believe in the objective reality of some particular world-view. What Tim has rightfully been struggling to bring to our attention is that the words above, Christianity in particular, have precise, technical meanings in the context of reliable sources on religion. Various groups have different definitions of the same words. NPOV requires we do not adopt the definition of any particular group, in a comparitive article like the current one (so does scientific method). We cannot so bow to loose natural language usage that we compromise the distinctives of the groups we are discussing.

I'm uncertain as to whether we've completely finished with the issues recently discussed, but sourcing this article adequately to avoid unnecessary acrimony requires some treatment both of natural language and of doctrine. Neither the specialists nor the "common people" rule unilaterally in page like the current one. We need English language sources just like we need scriptures and their commentators. We cannot silence the contribution of the English language itself. Alastair Haines (talk) 07:33, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Alastair -- you are right that this is not a perfect solution. Doctrinally, Islam is closer to Christianity than Mormonism is: they are both monotheistic. Like Mormons, Islam claims to have the original faith of Jesus and his disciples. Islam has a new book that was revealed to restore the original faith, the Quran -- just as Mormonism has a new book that was revealed to restore the original faith, the Book of Mormon. Islam and Mormonism both look to the return of Jesus, whom they regard to be the Messiah.

But Islam is separate.

I appreciate the idea that self-definition cannot be the deciding factor, but we have no deciding factor at all that anyone can agree on.

I also appreciate the idea that this could be handled in a central place, as Ilkali suggested. The same would have to be done for Messianic Judaism -- and a principle of distinction must be established that won't divide a billion hairs in the quest for clarity. We need a workable rule of thumb that is reasonable to all (or most) editors.

But it troubles me that Mormonism, which has LITERAL gender is concatenated with an entirely different religion which does not.

I'm open to suggestions, since I removed Messianic Judaism from the Judaism section on the precisely same principle that I removed Mormonism from the Christianity section -- while no one else offered a principle by which only one should have been moved and not the other (at least not one that was meaningful to me).

And here's the rub: to function as a collaborative effort principles need to be meaningful to the broadest category of editors as possible. When I look at Storm's notes I try to wrap a Christian perspective around them to see if it makes sense, and when that fails I try to wrap a Jewish (i.e. non-Christian) perspective around them to see if it makes sense. Finally, I try to wrap a secular perspective. Here's what I get:

1. From a Christian perspective Mormonism isn't Christianity because Christianity universally defines itself according to the doctrinal limitations of the Nicene Creed. This excludes Mormonism, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Arianism, etc.
2. From a Jewish perspective Mormonism may as well be Christianity because Judaism sees Christianity as polytheistic (more or less), and Mormonism's outright polytheism is refreshingly honest. But they call themselves Christian and they have that Jesus-guy and pesky New Testament thrown in the mix, so (in the words of my late father in law) it's "close enough for government work".
3. From a secular perspective they are a religious group that believes in Jesus and the New Testament. Who cares about doctrine? That's for Christians to fight about.

What troubles me is that Mormonisn is only "Christianity" from a non-Christian perspective!!''! If that's the case, then no group really can say who they are. There's no principle by which Judaism can say "Messianic Judaism isn't Judaism." Sure Messianics believe in the New Testament and Jesus, but one could just as easily pick something else as your external POV. I've seen way too many instances in which a Jew says that Judaism doesn't believe in Jesus, and a Christian will get confused and say, "but don't Messianic Jews believe in Jesus?" And they aren't being rhetorical. They are really confused.

I've dealt with both Mormonism and Messianic Judaism on the same principle -- and on that principle if Mormonism is Christianity then Messianic Judaism is Judaism. I believe that in an earlier discussion here some months ago there was another editor here who ALSO had a consistent principle by which he argued that Messianic Judaism was Judaism and Mormonism was Christianity. In other words -- he had a principle and was consistent with it.

While some folks here may feel that they have a principle that is meaningful to them (as I do regarding mine), I do think some principle needs to be established that is meaningful across the board. If we agree on anything, at least we should be agreed that we are not agreed on methodology. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 15:35, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

You don't listen well do you? In fact, you don't listen at all. Let's look at this silly little statement you repetitively make even while it has been demonstrated that it is incorrect: "Doctrinally, Islam is closer to Christianity than Mormonism is: they are both monotheistic" DOCTRINALLY, Christianity teaches that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the LIVING GOD, was born of the virgin Mary, lived a perfect life, performed miracles, bled from every pore in the Garden, was crucified, lay in the tomb three days, was resurrected, appeared to his disciples, sits at the right hand of the Father, and will return again one day. Additionally, it is only through Jesus that salvation is obtained. What does Islam not teach? He was crucified, did not die on the cross, was not resurrected, and did not return to the Father as the Resurrected Son. More tellingly, that Jesus is not the only way to salvation. You belittle the crucifixion and resurrection, the Atonement of Jesus, and the Salvation that only Jesus offers, and choose instead to focus on the sole doctrine of monotheism. You erringly parrot that Mormonism is polytheistic. The problem is that you have yet to identify any of the gods of Mormonism outside of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Please enlighten us here, NOW! Who are these Mormon gods?

What is more important to Christianity? A belief in the crucifixion, resurrection, and Salvation of Jesus or a belief in monotheism? As far as I have ever heard anyone declare, Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection and his offered salvation are the defining characteristics of Christianity. The definition that you use would deny Christianity to Jesus himself, all of apostles, and all of the disciples that lived during the time of Christ and many, if not most, of the believers up until the time of the Nicene Creed. This is the problem with this contrived definition of Christianity. What you are really seeking to define is who is in relationship with the Catholic Church, its history, and its doctrines. The LDS Church and others denominations that are not Trinitarian often claim no direct relationship with Catholic Church, but that does not deny their Christianity.

This is a secular encyclopedia and our definitions are secular in nature. It is perfectly acceptable to provide a referenced definition of Christianity as viewed by church X, but it is not acceptable to apply that definition to other churches and denominations.

It is perfectly acceptable to define Christianity as Trinitarian and Nontrinitarian.--^StormRider 17:05, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

"I also appreciate the idea that this could be handled in a central place, as Ilkali suggested". So why aren't we doing this? Ilkali (talk) 18:10, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I plan to do so at some point, but I'd like to have a coherent understanding of everyone's principles before offering a proposed synthesis of them. I have no intention of starting a war elsewhere, but rather stating a principle which would require the least amount of effort for editors and readers.

If a convention is flat wrong, then it would have to be changed across the board, but I'd rather not make that necessary. I'd rather offer a rationality that makes sense to everyone (myself included) for as much of the usage as is out there. I suspect that it's not uniform -- and perhaps there may be a rationality for there being no need of uniformity (such as in AD/BC vs CE/BCE). This isn't some soap-box.

If you'll note I've offered at least three different principles by which to lump together what everyone wanted, and they were repeatedly refused. Since we're already aware of the issues (and agendas) involved, we might as well finish what we can instead of starting some fresh (and unecessary) argument in a central location.

All I'm looking for is a workable principle by which Messianic Judaism is NOT in Judaism while Mormonism IS in Christianity. By "workable" it has to be acceptable to all involved... including the one group we keep trying to ignore -- Christians themselves.

Thanks.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 18:22, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

"I plan to do so at some point, but I'd like to have a coherent understanding of everyone's principles before offering a proposed synthesis of them". "Everyone" is just a few people. The point is to open it up to many more people, and I don't see why we need any preparation to do that. And until you've done that, and effected a change in convention, I don't think you should be edit-warring against current convention. Ilkali (talk) 18:37, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

But that's the problem -- there IS no current convention. There is plenty of usage out there, and not all consistent. I've pointed out the inconsistency: Messianic Judaism is/is-not Judaism and Mormonism is/is-not Christianity. Although I agree with you that this may not be the place to finish, we are already here, and all I'm looking for right now is a statement is principles (below) to take to the conventions area. Would you care to add something down there and help me round this out with some kernel to take with me? Thanks. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 18:49, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I listed a number of central, relevant pages that classified Mormonism as a Christian denomination. When finding those, I didn't see a single article claiming it was non-Christian. Usage may be inconsistent on the fringes, but the main articles appear undivided. And if there is legitimate space for disagreement there, all the more reason to encourage an explicit convention to form.

"Would you care to add something down there". No. I'm not going to contribute anything to the debate on this page. Ilkali (talk) 19:01, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Ilkali, that's not a debate thread. It's simply a request for a statement of the principles behind the decisions people are making here. I plan to make no response there, but rather to take the information to help me understand where everyone is coming from. Right now the only principle I see from you is "everyone seems to be doing it a certain way in my survey, so we go with the flow." That's actually an okay principle with me as a place to start. It's descriptive. Once I have something like that then I can work on some kind of prescriptive principle to put in a convention area. There's no use rewriting all of Wikipedia if it in fact is hugely going one way. It's like the invisible hand of the market -- economics is built around what actually happens rather than what "should" happen. Again, please state something down there so I have an idea where you are coming from. I plan to START with the compromise elsewhere, but right now I have no stated principles to synthesize. Thanks. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 19:15, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't view this as exporting an existing debate. Find a new venue, start fresh, present your view, invite alternative ones. If I have the time and energy, I might weigh in. Ilkali (talk) 19:45, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

"Please enlighten us here, NOW! Who are these Mormon gods?"

• You are one of them.

"What is more important to Christianity?..."

• I'm not talking about ideal or true or correct Christianity, but mainstream use of the word. Even granting that the Nicene Creed were born out of the pits of hell, it's STILL what is the normative framework of "Christianity" by it's greatest unchallenged scope of self-definition. Christian explicitly segregate themselves from non-Nicene beliefs such as yours. Let's say they are flat wrong. Let's say that Jesus would roll over in his grave, throw aside the stone, and scream at the Nicene for perverting his faith -- it doesn't matter in the context of normative use of that word. I don't give a euro whether Christianity is true or not -- how can I as a Jew? I'm only after clear frames of reference and consistency of usage in an English resource encyclopedia.

"It is perfectly acceptable to define Christianity as Trinitarian and Nontrinitarian"

• NOT TO CHRISTIANS. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 17:20, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Alastair, you vouched-safe this person's credibility? In those proverbial words, "Houston, we have a problem." Mormonism does not teach that I am a god. It is a complete distortion of LDS doctrine; something that is painfully obvious is that you have no understanding of LDS teachings, doctrines, or beliefs. What is worse, is that you don't learn or don't want to learn their teachings, but seemed possessed to spout distortions.

I think this conversation is at an end and there is no purpose conversing with you. Have a good day.--^StormRider 17:44, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Good -- I'm glad that the conversation of you interrogating me is over. Now for fairness: a conversation of my interrogating you.

1. I never said that you ALREADY ARE a god, but that you are potentially one. Look at the context. Now, am I wrong? Will you state, categorically, that "I will NEVER become a god. No Mormon will EVER become a god."
2. I never said that you WORSHIP more than one god, but that you believe more than one god has or will exist. Am I wrong? Will you state, categorically, that "There have never existed anywhere and there never will exist anywhere any other gods but God; God is the only God who has or will exist."

My interrogation is pretty simple. Just cut and paste and we can move on.

I don't expect it. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 18:05, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

PS -- as for character... I believe that I've been more than fair, offering at LEAST three different logical solutions and stating my principle. I've not seen any attempt at compromise from you. What I have seen are insults and sarcasm -- and misrepresentation.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 18:07, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

"I never said that you WORSHIP more than one god, but that you believe more than one god has or will exist". You repeatedly stated that Mormonism is polytheistic, which minimally entails belief in the current existence of multiple gods. It also strongly implies worship of at least some (and more than one) of those gods. You presumably know that Mormons don't consider themselves polytheistic and also that Mormonism is nothing like prototypical polytheistic religions, so I presume you also know that this choice of words was potentially misleading. It seems very much to me as though you deliberately misrepresented the religion (in this and in other ways) to make your point seem stronger. Ilkali (talk) 18:20, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate your suspicion, but it's not accurate. Mormons (according to everything I've read) believe there are limitless gods currently in existence, and that it is a growing number, with themselves eventually joining the mix. Each god is descended from a single father-deity who is the only god they worship in a continuous heirarchy delimited at each tier (i.e. they don't worship grandfather-gods, but ONLY father-gods). They themselves plan to become father-gods one day. Is this wrong? Perhaps everything I've read is wrong -- but I've not seen any indication of that in Storm's responses. He continuously frames his words in henotheistic hedges, instead of adamant monotheistic statements. I agree with you that there is deliberate misrepresentation going on here, but not from me. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 18:30, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Incidentally, it also doesn't help that you keep insulting editors or lying about their viewpoints in your edit summaries:

• "Stop pretending Mormons are Trinitarian". Nobody is claiming that.
• "This is getting tiring. Let's be honest and move on". They weren't being honest before?
• "reverted deliberate misrepresentation of Mormonism as a Trinitarian group". Again, nobody was saying Mormonism is Trinitarian.

I'm certain you don't think they're saying that Mormonism is Trinitarian. What everyone is plainly saying is that yes, Mormonism is non-Trinitarian, but that doesn't mean it's not Christian. Are you going to deny misrepresentation here too? Ilkali (talk) 23:36, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Ikali, there is no such thing as a grandfather god in Mormonism. The concept is a distortion of LDS teaching and doctrine. God is eternal and always was God. Anti-Mormons have a problem in that I have yet to read a a single anti-Mormon book, website, etc. that does not distort LDS doctrine...thus the name anti-Mormon.

What is often distorted is the statement by Lorenzo Snow, and concept discussed by Joseph Smith in a sermon. I think St. Athanasius of Alexandria stated it best, "God became man so that man might become God." Snow's statement is, "As man now is, God once was; and as God now is, man may become." This concept is best illustrated by Jesus' life. He became man and was God. Though the spirit of man is eternal, it is only through Jesus Christ that we may become joint-heir's with Christ. The LDS Church takes the bible at face value; we may become joint-heirs with Christ. This process is known as exaltation or theosis. However, the process of becoming one with God has nothing to do being a pantheon of gods as is found in poytheism. To level the claim that anyone who teaches the doctrine of theosis is a polytheist is to accept that almost all of the early patristic fathers are polytheists, which is absurd.

LDS Scripture, as has been demonstrated, is clear that there is one God. The difficulty, even illogical, position is that LDS doctrine clearly defines three distinct beings Father, Son, and Holy Ghost and these three make one God. The concept is better stated as the Bible states it, one Godhead (see Acts 17:29, Romans 1:20, and Colossians 2:9).

LDS Scripture does use the term "gods", but the context is often, if not always, distorted by those outside the church. The Church speaks from a context of becoming gods i.e. that God's plan has always been that we become one with Him. The LDS Church may also speak from a context of calling preexitent beings gods, but the context is not God or a being capable or worthy of worship. Their existence is dependent upon and not outside of God. There is no pantheon of Gods in Mormonism.

The concept of becoming gods and creating our own worlds is not doctrine and is not found in LDS canon. There have been individuals who have contemplated that in the eternities that may be something that will be done, but it has never been accepted as doctrine. It is similar to other individuals who have stated that Christians will be given wings and join concourses of angels to sing for an eternity. Nice conjecture, but it has no merit in scripture. We simply have not been told or taught what we will be doing in the eternities except that our greatest hope is to be with God. Does this help, Ikali? --^StormRider 19:10, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Just for the record, I don't especially object to this version of the article, even though I don't really see the point of emphasising the trinitarian/non-trinitarian distinction. Ilkali (talk) 23:36, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Statement of Principles (please give a short statement of principle)

Once again, my principle is that of self-definition: all groups define themselves, and if there is a conflict, a superset keeps the unmodified name rather than a subset. Generally we could take everyone's own designation UNLESS the mainstream group specifically objects to their inclusion. Mainstream wins -- not because it is right, but because it is normative.

So, there is (Rabbinic) Judaism and (Messianic) Judaism. The larger group objects that (Messianic) Judaism is not Judaism. Rather than give the modifier "Rabbinic" to Judaism, we give the modifier instead to "Messianic" Judaism.

It's not "Rabbinic Judaism" and "Messianic Judaism". It's just "Judaism" and "Messianic Judaism."

Same for Christianity and Mormonism. Christianity is the larger group. They universally object to the inclusion of Mormon type doctrines (and vice versa). They cannot BOTH have the unmodified name "Christian".SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 15:35, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

This argument contains a logical fallacy. It uses itself to define Christianity as actually a major subset of Christians, and appeals to its own authority to exclude other groups from Christianity. No secular definition of Christianity precludes non-Trinitarians from being Christian. Even official Catholic sites indicate that non-Trinitarian Christians are still Christians. Note the Catholic Encylcopedia's definition of Unitarian. It does not describe all Unitarian religions as non-Christian, and it explicitly indicates that modern usage is usually about Christian Unitarian groups: "In its general sense the name designates all disbelievers in the Trinity, whether Christian or non-Christian; in its present specific use it is applied to that organized form of Christianity which lays emphasis on the unity of the personality of God." [1]--Jeffro77 (talk) 19:40, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Jeffro -- anyone else? Alastair? Storm? Ilkali? Worst bite I'll give is a thank you here. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 20:05, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Also, Jeff... do I understand your principle to be that of following the usage of the Catholic Encyclopedia as a secular source? I want to synthesize your affirmative principle correctly. Thanks. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 20:07, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I most certainly do not regard the Catholic Encyclopedia to be a suitable basis for secular definitions. However, I have quoted it here to show that even the theological Catholic view does not exclude non-Trinitarian religions from Christianity, nor does it attempt to apply belief in the Trinity as a prerequisite for definition of Christian.--Jeffro77 (talk) 20:38, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Regarding the principle of 'self-definition', a group can define itself in any way it likes, just as it can also provide its own classification of other groups but neither are neutral. If a hypothetical person self-identifies as 'Christian' but believed in some other person (say, their uncle Bob) as the Christ (distinctly, and not merely as the 'returned' Jesus), we would rightly ignore their self-identification because it does not conform to the basic secular definition of 'a person who follows the teachings of Jesus whom they believe to be the Christ and the son of god'.--Jeffro77 (talk) 21:02, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Jeffro, thanks again. If I understand you correctly, then, religious groups must be defined according to secular definitions, rather than according to their own doctrinal boundaries, no matter how fiercely they insist upon them. Do you have sources that you prefer over others, such as Websters, OED, etc., or would any dictionary do? SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 21:46, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I think my position has been aptly demonstrated already, and further attempts to obfuscate the issue are unnecessary.--Jeffro77 (talk) 21:51, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Okay, so you DON'T regard a dictionary as a secular source? I think I'm being more than reasonable here -- trying to understand your position. I can neither agree nor disagree with your position if I do not understand it, and if you won't state it clearly I cannot regard it as part of any synthesis.

Look, I've been bending over backwards to give the grouping that other people want with some kind of rationality to justify such a grouping. Again and again the grouping was kept with the justification removed and no competing rationale to replace it.

My understanding of your position is that a secular definition should be presented as NPOV. I have no objections to that as a rationale. It's a viable one. All I've asked is what sources you've found acceptable. The Catholic Encyclopedia is the only one you've given, and as you said it is not a secular source. So? This isn't difficult and it's not a trick question. What kind of sources do you like? My assumption was a dictionary and it seemed reasonable, but now you are indicating some kind of objection to that -- without giving me anything. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 22:29, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Secular sources are indeed more reliable than theological sources for secular definitions. However, this doesn't seem to be the centre of your argument. You have repeatedly indicated your position that 'Christians' reject non-Trinitarian groups as being Christian - a position which has been shown to not be in agreement with secular definitions (which do not mention the Trinity as having any bearing) or even mainstream Christian sources such as the Catcholic Encyclopedia (which explicitly includes non-Trinitarian groups as being Christian). No secular definition has been offered that would exclude either Messianic Jews or Mormons from being Christian from a secular point of view.--Jeffro77 (talk) 23:10, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Jeffro -- all I'm asking for is a "for instance" on one of your acceptable secular sources. You've already made it very clear that only NON-members of a group can define that group, hence the insistence on a secular source to define a religious group. I assume that only non-engineers can define engineering, and only non-males can define masculinity on the same principle. But you don't give any affirmative sources or principles here. It's easy to tear something down. It's harder to share and communicate affirmative principles -- but it's absolutely essential to a community effort such as Wikipedia. So far I'm the one compromising in offer after offer, stating affirmatively the principles involved. I'm not getting that from you, and would appreciate it if you would try. It's not THAT MUCH more effort than you've already given, and in fact the total effort you've expended would have been much less had you just started out with some open effort here. Again, please start. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 23:29, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

That is a complete misrepresentation of my position, perhaps deliberately. I have not said that only a non-member can define a group. However, a third-party perspective is also important - a person on drugs might believe they can fly; they might even believe they are flying, but it doesn't make it so. Additionally, the mundane examples you provide are testable without self-definitions needing to be applied by members of those groups, and are ratified by plain definitions thereof. Your examples therefore validate my view.--Jeffro77 (talk) 23:44, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

As for your request for an instance of a secular source - as previously stated, I am yet to see any secular source that would define Christianity in any way other than I have previously indicated. It is therefore mundane to provide a single preferred source in support of my view.--Jeffro77 (talk) 23:47, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm glad that you have retracted from your insistence that only non-members can define a group, and that groups are allowed to have a voice in their own definition. That granted, I'm happy that you will now accept non-secular sources when dealing with non-secular groups.

I have not made any retraction per se, and my position has not changed. I will, and always would, accept non-secular sources that are presenting objective views rather than their own theological opinions. (Where theological beliefs themselves are the subject of an article, such sources can of course be used to reference those beliefs.)--Jeffro77 (talk) 22:11, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

And if THAT is a "misrepresentation" I cannot help you; religious groups are not secular groups. I have to either address your allowance for (at least partial) self definition, OR address your insistence on only secular definitions -- but not both.

As it stands, however, I'm now out of time to discuss this further. The shipment of my book is arriving today, and I'll be working full time with it. If you choose to continue an argument of some kind, please pick one side or the other -- and then you'll win by default because I have no more time to figure out which you to address. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 13:02, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Do LDS claim to be Christian? Yes! Do others claim they are not? Yes! NPOV requires we cannot take sides. But this is not the place for that discussion.

This is a side-track if even the current text is inspected. The Catholic heading says nothing distinctive to Catholicism. It only says what Protestants and Orthodox also believe. It also includes early Syriac writers! I don't know whose idea the headings were, but they are no more descriptive of the text than of any rational methodology. This is not an article about Christianity, it is a comparative religion article. There is a major difference. There is a different "default".

Tim and Jeffro, you are both demonstrating lots of quick thinking and tight reasoning, but appear to be working at cross purposes because you are both dodging weaknesses in the positions you are defending.

Jeffro is quite right that no specific doctrinal position claiming to be definitive of Christianity can be accepted on the authority of the group that makes the claim, when other groups make the same claim but provide a different definition.

Tim is quite right that no secular source has any authority a priori to define Christianity since they are not representatives of any branch of the faith.

I see the strange phenomenon of Tim having to struggle to accept that the Oxford English Dictionary accepts even Arians as Christians, under a broad form of usage of the word.

I also see the bizarre implication from Jeffro that Wiki should express a POV on what constitutes Christian belief, and use non-Christian sources to do so. Try that approach with particle physics!

What is sad is that this conflict need not be happening at all. This article topic simply does not require classification of Christian denominations, it only requires classification of published views regarding the gender of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, where these are held to be divine persons.

Jehovah's Witnesses do not believe Jesus is divine, so irrespective of whether they are Christian or not, their views on his gender are no more relevant to this article than their views about the ongoing pattern of gender (but not sex) for the redeemed who will walk on the "New Earth".

The current heading Catholicism adds nothing but confusion to the article. The text is good, the text addresses different points of views on the gender of the persons of the Christian Trinity. The headings and their heirarchy have been unstable for some time because they are unnecessary, unhelpful, unsourced and POV.

No-one has established that headings are necessary. No-one has established that this article needs to cover the POV of each of more than 30,000 Christian denominations.

I propose that all readers need to know is that people have interpreted the New Testament to teach that there are three divine persons—Father, Son and Spirit—and that these are all masculine. Reporting alternatives only requires us to note that various groups have modified views both of the divinity of these persons and of their gender. LDS additionally permit that there is a sense in which all may become divine, without this sense of divinity implying worship (if I have not misunderstood them).

Just which of the alternative views may be admitted as falling within particular views of what constitutes an "appropriate" definition of Christianity need not concern us at all. Thank God! Alastair Haines (talk) 01:04, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

"I also see the bizarre implication from Jeffro that Wiki should express a POV on what constitutes Christian belief, and use non-Christian sources to do so. Try that approach with particle physics!" Bad analogy. Identifying as Christian doesn't grant any special ability or authority to define what it means to identify as Christian. Physics is a specialist field, but language belongs to all of us.

"Jehovah's Witnesses do not believe Jesus is divine, so irrespective of whether they are Christian or not, their views on his gender are no more relevant to this article than [...]". You're the first person to talk about JWs.

"No-one has established that headings are necessary". Headings are useful. We group discussion of a variety of beliefs under the heading 'Christianity' because: 1) they have significant similaries, and 2) they're related.

I can't really critique your point because I'm not sure what kind of structure you're suggesting. Could you precisely describe (or perhaps demonstrate) how you would have the article look? Ilkali (talk) 01:24, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Reply to Ilkali: Theology is a specialist field. Thank you for seconding my point about language usage. The OED talks about Arians. You provide no specific defence of the currently inappropriate headings. I've provided text to the article, sources, quotes and talk in discussion regarding the last. I'm happy to hear your specific interaction with those details when you've had time to catch up on all that. Alastair Haines (talk) 01:56, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

"Theology is a specialist field". Yes. But theologian is not the same as Christian.

"You don't interact with specifics regarding headings". I'm still waiting for specifics, Alastair.

"I've provided text to the article, sources, quotes and [...]". Stop being offended and listen to what I'm actually saying. All I'm talking about here is the headings. You say that "no-one has established that headings are necessary". Okay! But if we just took the current version of the article and removed all the headings without making any other changes, it'd be a mess. I assume that's not what you actually mean. We need some structure. What structure are you proposing? Ilkali (talk) 02:07, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not in the least offended. I have answered your questions elsewhere, though ... repeatedly, please look. Alastair Haines (talk) 02:19, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not gonna go hunting for an opinion that I don't think you ever expressed. If you're not willing to offer a proposal (or to link to where you offered it previously), I don't know what the point of your above comment was. Ilkali (talk) 13:05, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

My 'implication' about what constitutes Christian belief isn't actually bizarre at all. And thanks for a good example to illustrate why - an article can rightly say that a certain physicist (or even the majority of them) has a particular theory, however we can't say that the universe is that way, as that would not be a neutral point of view (unless we are dealing with established facts. Further, I am not necessarily saying that we cannot use Christian sources, but I am saying that we should not paint theological views (including the opinions that subgroups have of other groups) as fact.

This entire debate is largely resolved already in the content of the main article, God.

JWs believe Jesus (post-resurrection) to be 'divine' ('god-like'), so gender is still relevant there, but not as much as their views about the gender of God ('Jehovah'), which of course is the same as mainstream Christianity (i.e., male).

Only notable distinctions among Christian denominations need to be covered in this article. Catholicism probably does not need its own heading in this article, as Catholic views on the gender of God are the same as the views of a great many Christian religions.--Jeffro77 (talk) 02:20, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Reply to Jeffro: It looks to me as if we are agreeing. The word "Christian" is not even necessary for the article logic, it is merely a convenient label, and it would look odd were it absent or only present in modified forms. Remember, I am more sympathetic to classifying LDS within a loose sense of the word "Christian" than Tim is. The Oxford establishes the appropriateness of the usage in the context of discussion of the gender of God or gods. My point is simply that this cannot be pressed too far. It's actually irrelevant to this article to discuss whether Mormonism is Christianity in any precise sense or not, because Christianity is not the topic. However, were Christianity the topic, Christians absolutely are the authorities for what it is they believe. No one is proposing that they are authorities for the way the supernatural world actually is. And if that was our topic, materialists would be no more expert than the supernaturalists regarding metaphysical speculation, in fact they would be less expert since they do not waste time studying the topic. Alastair Haines (talk) 02:36, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree with you on what is important for this article in the context in which it is discussed. Tabling this whole silliness about who is and is not a real Christian is best for this article. I have previously participated in this caliber of conversation numerous times on Wikipedia. As you review other articles you will see, as Ilkali has stated, Mormonism is always mentioned under Christianity. The LDS Church may be viewed by specific churches as heretical, a cult, a demon-inspired monstrosity, etc., but all we have at the end of the day is an opinion and nothing more. Cheers. --^StormRider 03:10, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Alastair, I do agree with your position to a considerable extent. However, in the statement, "Christians absolutely are the authorities for what it is they believe", one must be careful to avoid a self-referencing definition of Christian by dogmatically asserting the opinions of a subset of them as defining (or excluding) the rest of them.--Jeffro77 (talk) 22:11, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

It is perfectly possible to present the information neutrally and this article will ultimately achieve that. It is possible to slow that process down, but non-neutrality will always cause friction until the equilibrium is returned.

Personally, I think the debate has been helpful in establishing that context decides the sense of the word "Christian" that is most appropriate, and that sources specific to the topic are the reliable guides.

I still want more information in the article regarding actual LDS views of gender. The recent addition was outstanding.

It seems we're also getting to the end of the parallel discussion, where some have been proposing Christianity must be defined by its critics. I think you've been right on that subject too, Storm. The LDS cannot be defined by its critics, and nor can Christianity.

People are the only authority for defining themselves, just illegitimate sources for evaluating themselves.

As it is with LDS and critics, so it is with Christianity and critics. Your ardent defence of LDS as part of a broad "Christianity" does indeed serve that broad area of thinkers by defending it similarly against self-evaluating, illigitimate criticisms. Thank you. But not just as a Christian, simply as a rational mind. Alastair Haines (talk) 03:38, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

As I have thought further about it, I suppose it is possible to discuss LDS as those who follow Jesus Christ, or disciples of Jesus Christ, or even followers of Jesus Christ rather than refer to them as Christian; that may placate those who demand that only Trinitarians can properly be called Christian. It is a distinction without a difference in my opinion, but it is an option.

What offends LDS is the notion of denying that they have a relationship with Jesus Christ by calling them non-Christian. A LDS never denies that relationship with the Savior of mankind for any other group. That relationship for LDS is the central focus of the Gospel and to not have it is to not know God.

There is much that needs to be added to this article. For Eastern Orthodoxy is there gender after this life? What is the meaning of the resurrection relative to gender? When the early Father's taught theosis, did they address gender? --^StormRider 05:29, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Storm -- as I've repeatedly stated and state here again, I have no intention of saying you do not have a relationship with Jesus Christ, nor even that you are not a "true" Christian. If you'll recall, I've repeatedly granted that your religion could be the only true New Testament faith, and that the Nicene Creed could be a horrible perversion.

My point is that this makes you DIFFERENT from (Nicene) Christianity, even to the point of being a different religion. You have stated that the Nicene Creed is an invention of man. Your own missionaries try to convert Christians -- to what? The same thing? No -- a different religion from (Nicene) Christianity.

And my principle has been to give a modified name to smaller groups, rather than larger groups. Thus in (Rabbinic) Judaism and (Messianic) Judaism, "Judaism" goes to the Rabbinic group. Does that make them right or wrong? It's not even a consideration. Heck, the Karaites could be the "only true" Judaism but they don't get the name "Judaism" because of their size -- hence "Karaites".

If you'll note in these discussions we've talked about Christians and Mormons. If you were to say "Christians and Mormons" in a crowd they'd know you were talking about two different groups: (Nicene) Christians and Mormons. But if you were to say "Trinitarians and Christians" in a crowd they'd think you were talking about the same group.

Is the crowd right? It doesn't matter. I've only been arguing in favor of using terms in their normative uses. As it stands, the present state of the article is acceptable if it segregates Trinitarians from Non-Trinitarians. Those with a hint of doctrinal or historical backgroup will be annoyed at the inclusion of Non-Trinitarians, but they'll live. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 12:55, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

This conclusion actually assumes quite a lot about the opinions held by 'the crowd'. The fact that the qualification of '(Nicence) Christians' has been included above is the very nature of the problem. In fact, 'the crowd' may not even know about the Council of Nicea, which does not preclude understanding the definition of 'Christian'.--Jeffro77 (talk) 22:11, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) Reply to Storm: Yes, yes and yes! Yes, "followers of Jesus Christ" fits all of natural language, denominational name, and the restricted consideration of gender of the persons some view as a Trinity (whatever that means). Yes, we cannot state in this article that the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints are not in actual fact followers of Jesus, commonly known as Christian. Yes, the Syrians are in and so can Gnostics be in (the article that is). It is not the business of this article to define the boundaries of Christian orthodoxy (narrowly or widely), it is its business to document the views of notable groups regarding the gender (and divinity) of the persons commonly understood to be presented by the New Testament as worthy of worship, on account of being divine. So, again: yes, yes and yes. As you say, co-operative editing is always a pleasure for you; I'd add that it is often a challenge, and you have made that challenge decidedly easier at the current page. You have my heartfelt thanks. Alastair Haines (talk) 10:36, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

So, Tim, not a debate thread? Ilkali (talk) 13:05, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Wasn't supposed to be. I never got the affirmative principles that I asked for. But this is what I think I gleaned:

1. Tim -- the mainstream group's self-identified boundaries should be considered.
2. Jeffro -- external identifications should be considered.
3. Ilkali -- wording needs to be without hint of bias such as "mainstream" before "trinitarian."
4. Storm -- broader definitions like "follower of Jesus" should be considered.
5. Alastair -- basic references such as the OED should provide examples to follow (such as the inclusion of Gothic -- i.e. Arian -- as a type of Christianity).

These are the positive elements that I've distilled from the dicussion. I could be wrong on some of these points, but this was the best I could decipher given the fact that so many people here adamantly refused to provide a simple affirmative statement.

I'd also like to add that HAD everyone provided simple affirmations without bolting from the gate with "Tim's affirmation has a logical fallacy" we wouldn't have had a debate at all in this thread.

As it stands, I think that all of these affirmations together are much better than any single affirmation by itself. There are problems, limitations, and exceptions to each in isolation.

And in the article we've included Mormonism as a type of "Christianity" as per Alastair, Jeffro, Ilkali, and Storm, while leaving in two words that I needed: Trinitarian and Non-Trinitarian. I was able to bridge the cognitive dissonance of "non-trinitarian christianity" thanks to Alastair's note from the OED.

And, Ilkali -- what did you learn? Anyone else? I may have missed something in my take. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 14:36, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

"Wasn't supposed to be". But it was always going to be. There was no need for this. Ilkali (talk) 15:08, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

No, there was no need for people to refuse to give affirmative principles, and no need for me to have to decipher it through pointless challenges people made, and no need for you to refuse to state anything positive you learned here just now.

No need for all the push back on a simple positive request I had to see what people affirmed.

And, I suppose, no need for me to try to get something positive from you now. But I thought I'd try one more time.

And now, it's time for me to get to work in the real world.

Be well. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 15:34, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

What do you want from me? I predicted something would happen and it did. Why are you trying to squeeze a moral out of that? And why aren't you learning from it and doing what I originally suggested? Ilkali (talk) 16:03, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

SkyWriter, it was not possible to acquiesce with the conditions originally provided and merely give principles to support them, because there were problems with the conclusions involved (in my opinion and apparently the opinions of others as well). If we liken Christianity to the USA, we might say that Mormons are Alaska and Messianic Jews are Hawaii. They're still all part of the United States, even though they're not part of the contiguous mainland, and can be recognised as such by basic secular definition.--Jeffro77 (talk) 22:11, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Stating affirmatively your own principles is not acquiescence -- it's simply dealing with positive collaboration rather than tearing each other down in debate. I couldn't reverse engineer the logic of everyone's position in a vacuum, and that was all I was getting; every time I made a proposal that would either include or exclude Mormons based on a naming rationale, it was simply rejected -- with no logically consistent rationale given to replace it. I went through FOUR of these sequences before finally giving up and asking "where are you coming from" so that some semblance of collaboration could occur, both here and in the arena Ilkali suggested.

Instead I got from you, Jeffro, "this is a logical fallacy". Look, I wasn't asking you if you disagreed with me. I already knew that. What I was asking was what you DID agree with. I had the crazy idea that people had something in mind to support their own position, rather than just being reactive against mine.

Even now, trying to end on a positive note by saying what I THINK I could reverse engineer from the discussions, I got absolutely nothing by way of "hey, you were right on that decipherment and here's what I got out of it myself." Nothing.

Just exactly HOW is collaboration supposed to occur if no one has a stated principle, an affirmative statement, or a positive note of any kind?

As for groups theological interpretations -- I was never once trying to decide which was "true" Christianity. Since I'm Jewish, I had no vested stake. But I did have an indirect stake: Messianic Judaism vs. Judaism. I removed Messianic Judaism from Judaism on the same affirmative principle that I removed Mormonism from Christianity. No one had a problem (this time) about the Messianic Judaism move, but I had made that move before only to find it reversed months later when I wasn't watching. That made me think a bit harder on my rationale, and I consistently applied it to all groups. All groups define themselves, and when there is a mismatch superset trumps subset. You used the Alaska and Hawaii example. I'd like to give one as well. Imagine that Puerto Rico decided that it was actually a state, but the United States defined itself as a fifty state union that did not include Puerto Rico. The superset decides what "is" and not what "should be". Theological self-definitions, although framed in idealistic terms that pretend to define objective reality, instead only define subjective reality. That is -- theological definitions don't really tell us what God is, but rather what groups think. Christianity has defined itself in the broadest category as a group that is not only Trinitarian, but emphatically NOT non-Trinitarian. Should it be Trinitarian? Is God really Triune? Who cares? Certainly not we Wiki-editors. It's above our paygrade. But it's also above our paygrade to invent a definition for Christianity that is manifestly against the mainstream restrictions.

Mormonism is that Puerto Rico of my analogy. It doesn't matter that it defines itself a state of the Union, if that Union itself does not say so. And protestations of our new president regarding 57-58 states notwithstanding, we still define ourselves at present with 50.

I still have received no positive affirmation of principle from you or Ilkali or Storm. I've had to guess, and even my guesses are not answered. In the end I was the one who had to acquiecse, because I was out of time. My book was supposed to be delivered today, and it was delayed a day -- hence my ability to answer you now.

But this thread should have been drastically shorter. Leaving me to guess served no one's interest, unless you just like to debate for the sake of it -- and there are better venues for that, aren't there? So, I'm out of time. You've invented a quasi-reality in which Christianity means something it has often lethally denied for a millenium and a half. Congratulations. But it's not real. "The Christians and Mormons were arguing with each other" gives everyone a shrug, while "The Trinitarians and Christians were arguing with each other" gives everyone a most puzzled look -- with good reason. The English language hasn't changed by the power of Wikipedia, and neither has the culture at large. You've simply left us with a fiction that will stand for now because of circumstances. It could very well stand forever -- but only really here in this little Wiki-corner.

And because of your victory here someone will notice that it's illogical to have Messianic Judaism and Mormonism both in the Christianity section, when there is a nice little Judaism section waiting to suck Messianic right back in. And why not? If Mormons can tell Christians that they really aren't Trinitarians after all -- then Messianics can order Jews around just as well. We've inverted the principle of self-definition here and now have subsets defining supersets. And I have no interest in sticking around asking for a logical principle in support of utter chaos; a chaos in which you will only let non-members of the Christianity group define them. Good luck to you. You'll need it. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 23:08, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

In case it's still not clear, the reason I didn't present my case here was that I didn't want to anchor the issue to this talk page. Any lack of tenderness on my part was due to suspicion over why you weren't immediately taking it to a bigger venue as you suggested you would. That suspicion still exists.

And I'm disappointed to see more dishonesty from you in the claim "You've simply left us with a fiction that will stand [...] but only really here in this little Wiki-corner". As I've already shown, it's the convention all throughout Wikipedia to represent Mormonism as Christian. You know that. And you knew, when you made the comments documented here, that they weren't true either. How can you bemoan a lack of positivity when this is how you approach editors? Ilkali (talk) 23:57, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Ilkali -- Wikipedia IS the corner. Wikipedia doesn't determine convention; it follows it or it doesn't, but it doesn't create it. Your claims of dishonesty are misguided at best, and dishonest at worst. Although I was more than interested in taking it to your suggested venue, I wanted to get a sense of what was already being held in people's heads in an existing conversation. It does no good to take something to a new venue if you aren't clear what it is, and I've still not received positive affirmation to take anywhere. So I can show up on some central venue and take with me... what? A vacuum? Any intelligent editor would laugh me out of there, and they should. But with some positive affirmations from different POVs there would be better ground to raise the issue. Also, as I've stated in the past, I have no interest in creating a great deal of work for people. The overhead on Wikipedia is already too much as it is. If Wikipedia really does practice sloppiness throughout its designation of Christianity, then there are different ways to refine it. Perhaps making Trinitarian Christians and non-Trinitarian Christians is the best solution to the problem for pragmatic reasons, rather than precision ones. Perhaps making actual Christianity reflected by the word (as in all seminaries) is the best. Alastair's use of "Gothic Christianity" really is like "Messianic Judaism" in relation to Judaism. Just as Judaism doesn't require the "Rabbinic" designation because of redundancy, "Trinitarian Christianity" is also redundant. In other words, it's not "Rabbinic Judaism" and "Messianic Judaism" as if they are on the same footing, but rather "Judaism" and "Messianic Judaism." The modifier denotes something that is not mainstream, while the mainstream needs no modifier. So, it is not "Trinitarian Christianity" (redundant) and "non-Trinitarian Christianity" but rather "Christianity" and "non-Trinitarian Christianity". I know you like to play around in the convention areas and create things -- but that's not really the role of those areas. Those areas are to reflect what the typical reader will understand in the simplest and clearest format. "Trinitarians" do not argue against "Christians" (because without the modifier they are the same thing). But "Christians" DO argue against "Gothic Christians". The modifer says that there's something different about the group from the unmodified term. In any case, perhaps when I get some time I'll go to the venue you suggested. Since I'll be taking my own suggestion with a vaccum from you and Storm and Jeffro, it will be lopsided and the discussion will take longer than necessary. As such, I'll have to do it when I get more time, which is up as of tomorrow at 4pm. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 00:44, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

"It does no good to take something to a new venue if you aren't clear what it is". Here's what it is: Is Mormonism an instance of Christianity? That's it. You don't need to explicitly export all the views of the people involved here. Just start the topic and, if they want to, they'll chime in.

"I have no interest in creating a great deal of work for people. The overhead on Wikipedia is already too much as it is". You've created an enormous amount of work for people here, by ignoring convention and insisting on a per-article terminology. If we multiplied that by the number of articles pertaining to Mormonism, the total would be astronomical. As I've repeatedly stressed, the point of centralised convention is to reduce the amount of work needed by ensuring that each discussion occurs in one place only, rather than several. Ilkali (talk) 01:53, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

"It does no good to take something to a new venue if you aren't clear what it is". Here's what it is: Is Mormonism an instance of Christianity? That's it. -- No, Ilkali, that is most emphatically NOT "it", at least not to me. Since I couldn't GUESS what "it" is for you, how about you tell me what "it" is for me, eh? I've stated it repeatedly, and you didn't even come close. Try again, and if you don't care to, then that's an admission that Wikipedia editors like you and me can't read minds. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 03:01, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Ikali, I sympathise with you feeling perplexed. Though I'm equally perplexed by your reply. No big deal though, I only hear a personal interaction, not a content issue between you and Tim. I'll stay out of it. Alastair Haines (talk) 22:37, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Jeffro, I think you are still missing that secular definitions generally only operate at the level of language usage. Who defines how much federal tax is paid in Alaska and Hawaii? When US states allow Afghanistan to tax them, that's when external definitions will be definitive over self-definitions. Alastair Haines (talk) 22:37, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Your example is superfluous to the metaphor, and is akin to allowing Islamic bodies to define Christianity (though a parallel exists in this usage of the extention of the metaphor, the implied correlation is incidental). Using secular definitions to define Christianity would be more akin to an impartial body such as the UN's recognition of the right of the US to levy taxes on its constituents. Continuing with this analogy, regardless of whether citizens of the contiguous states regard Alaskans or Hawaiians as 'real' Americans, it doesn't change the fact that the administrations of the various states do not dispute the validity of the inclusion of Hawaii and Alaska. (In case that's getting too abstract, it means that although members of mainstream Christian religions may dispute the validity of less orthodox (small o) Christian groups, such groups are still recognised by official mainstream Churches as 'Christian', as demonstrated earlier by the quote from the Catholic Encyclopedia's recognition of Unitarians as Christians.)--Jeffro77 (talk) 23:23, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Your example is excellent to make the point. Secular sources cannot be assumed to be neutral. They frequently have clearly defined personal biases of their own. Dawkin's anger at all religions is tangible. If he's right about religion (and regarding many features I agree with him) he is absolutely right to be angry. However, on other things his anger blinds him to features a neutral party would feel compelled to acknowledge.

Jesus himself, whose teaching is at the heart of all "Christian" groups, is profoundly against religion, so much so that he was killed for it. Dawkins has more in common with Jesus than he realises. Their differences are about God, not religion.

But to return to your point and your illustration, the view that any secular source is a superior source to any religious source regarding an understanding of that religion's own beliefs is no more true than the suggestion that a United Nations security council decision shows no bias of its own in making recommendations regarding how nations should conduct their own internal affairs.

I'm very surprised to hear anyone propose such a thing. Fortunately, the Wiki way is to bypass issues of bias, which are real, but non-trivial to prove, by assuming good faith, relying on expert sources and documenting notable alternative PsOV. Wiki stays humble.

It would be all too easy for Wiki itself to fall into a trap of bias were it to enter into evaluating sources beyond the limits it wisely sets for itself. Alastair Haines (talk) 03:34, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Who mentioned Dawkins? Of course a source should not necessarily be assumed to be neutral. But it is quite a leap to go from dictionary definitions of 'Christian' to anti-theist literature. I suppose you're not too far off in the statement that Dawkins is like Jesus in some regard (though I would think he is certainly aware of it) - Jesus believed that there was only one true god. Dawkins just goes one extra step.--Jeffro77 (talk) 05:29, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Too many sections

The same two people keep making new section after new section on this talk page, and it's usually to discuss something that's already being discussed in an existing section. Stop it, please. At the very least, use sub-headings. Ilkali (talk) 00:21, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Messianic Judaism

I have been reading the article and I see no difference between the Messianic Judaism position and that of the Catholic position. If there is not a significant difference, there should not be a separate section. If we are looking to add "me too" citations, then we should do it within the respective sections. Thoughts? --^StormRider 03:47, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I actually agree with you on that one. It's redundant. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 04:11, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I am going to delete, but it should be brought back if something significant comes up.--^StormRider 04:25, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Just noticed while I was editing that the section had been removed. It's largely covered under the 'other variations' section anyway, with regard to feminine views of 'rua(c)h', so there doesn't seem to be any compelling argument to retain it. Hopefully that will be the end of the matter.--Jeffro77 (talk) 05:38, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Few Messianics believe in a feminine HS. Someone simplified a heading a fair while ago that left a misleading impression.

I like the "me too" description of the titles. Have we removed Catholicism yet, since there are no differences between it and normative Trinitarianism?

It would be fun for the section to go back to being about gender rather than denominationalism. Alastair Haines (talk) 05:53, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Sarcasm aside, if there are indeed significant elements pertaining to Messianic Judaism, then put it back in. Catholicism is there because it mentions details unique to Catholic belief (though I'm not entirely sure they're notable).--Jeffro77 (talk) 05:57, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Um... if Muslims felt the same about God's gender as Hindus did, would we remove one of those sections too? I'm not sure "they have the same views" is sufficient to warrant merging sections. --Alynna (talk) 23:44, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

You are equating a comparison between supersets (Islam and Hinduism) with the views of a subset within a superset (Messianic Judaism and Christianity). It is not practical to exhaustively indicate the specific beliefs of every religious group within a particular superset, unless their differing views are notable within the scope of the article.--Jeffro77 (talk) 00:05, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

OK, that makes sense... if we are including Messianic Judaism in Christianity. I don't have the energy to figure out where that argument left off. I was initially confused because I thought someone was suggesting merging Messianic Judaism into Catholocism. --Alynna (talk) 00:14, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Look, this is really simple. So-called "messianic Judaism" is a form of evangelical Protestant Christianity. Literally. They admit this themselves, at conventions with other Protestant Christians. They have no relationship to Judaism, a.k.a. rabbinic Judaism. Agree with them or disagree with them, but don't imagine they have anything to do with Judaism. They use the word solely for deceptive marketing purposes (again, there are many records of them admitting this at meetings with other Protestant Christian evangelicals.) RK (talk)

Changed Christianity section

Section tagged with Weasel, POV and OR -- discussed in this section -- please do not remove until the dispute is resolved.

I have rewritten the introduction to the Christianity section, replacing the very poor quality intro that was there previously. I have also removed the need to classify specific religions in this article as Trinitarian or otherwise (which is not relevant in this article), removing the need for the continued debate, while retaining specific views held by various religions and the overarching views held by Trinitarian faiths.--Jeffro77 (talk) 05:33, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

When one is not expert on a subject it is often wise to consult before removing content. If you'd like your edits to be spared reversion when sourced and stable text is restored to the article, I suggest you try discussion seeking consensus for them first.

Additionally, you may like to explain how the Trinity is irrelevant to this article. The mainstream Christian view of God is unworthy of consideration among the views of other religions? Disbelieving it is certainly an acceptable POV, silencing it has no warrant in an encyclopedia. Alastair Haines (talk) 06:01, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I did not say the Trinity is not relevant to this article, as is very clearly demonstrated in my introduction to the Christianity section. I said that classification of specific religions as Trinitarian is irrelevant.--Jeffro77 (talk) 06:06, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

To what are you referring in regard to removal of content? The poor introduction to the Christianity section that had no bearing on the gender of God? or some other thing removed by an editor other than me?--Jeffro77 (talk) 06:10, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Jeffro's text

“ Most Christians conceive of God as the Trinity, having the belief that God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are distinct persons, but one being that is wholly God. Conversely, some Christian groups are Unitarian, believing that the Father is God, and that the Son and the Holy Spirit are entirely separate persons, or that the Holy Spirit is not a being, but an expression of God's power. Among all of these groups, most refer to all three elements in masculine terms, though there are variations in belief as to whether they are regarded to have any actual gender. ”

It's not my style to quibble over whether something is written in language to my taste or not, so looking at content here we find the assertion that, "some Christian groups are Unitarian". Unsourced and POV—the text has been altered to inject a POV, and one almost completely unnecessary to the article. Jeffro believes Christian groups fall into two categories: Trinitarian and Unitarian. Where did he learn this? How is it relevant? Where do we find a definition of Unitarian? Does he quote from a Unitarian statement of faith? Do those who hold the "entirely separate persons" view describe themselves as Unitarian? This is very original research. Is it based on any sources at all? Once we see one source, then it might be worth checking to see if it is due attention to a minority POV, but until even one source is cited, errors like this should be removed promptly according to words of Jimbo I've seen frequently cited. The final sentence is almost incoherent. I think I know what it is trying to say, but it's not a POV that has much serious support if my guess at its meaning is correct. Alastair Haines (talk) 06:36, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

"Where do we find a definition of Unitarian?"??? Given that the reader is reading an encyclopedia, and that the term is linked to an article about that very subject... just maybe a person might start there. Who'd have thought, huh? As for the final sentence, it introduces what follows in the sub-sections.--Jeffro77 (talk) 11:50, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Deleted text

In Christianity, the New Testament is the primary source of beliefs about God. Perhaps the two most significant debates in Christian history sought to understand what the New Testament implied regarding:

• Jesus as both God and man (Christology); and
• God as three persons in unity — the Trinity.[18]

The three persons of the Trinity are God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. The names "God the Father" and "God the Son", derived from the New Testament, clearly imply masculinity. In the case of the Son, masculinity is reinforced by the belief in his incarnation as the man, Jesus of Nazareth.

It is true that this introduction is a patchwork of the contributions of multiple editors, and any text can be tweaked to suit the tastes of various kinds of readers, but reliability of content and neutrality of presentation are the key issues. If Jeffro has objections to this text, or can recommend improvements, now's the time to do so. Alastair Haines (talk) 06:43, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

It appears that your intent here is simply to complain. The 'deleted text' is largely irrelevant to the purpose of this article, and the import of the deleted text has been completely retained anyway. Regarding your claim of 'weasel words', Wikipedia policy states that such usage is appropriate "When the holders of the opinion are too diverse or numerous to qualify. For example, "Some people prefer dogs as pets; others prefer cats." In any case, the intro I have provided is a starting point, which is much more relevant to the article than what was there previously. Is your purpose merely to complain, or to improve the article?--Jeffro77 (talk) 11:18, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Regarding your claim of original research, there does not seem to be anything that it is not abundantly known to be factual in the new intro (especially to someone who claims to be an expert on the subject), and after having been awake all night, I didn't happen to feel like trawling around for references yet, though there is no statement therein for which it would not be possible to provide a reference. The neutrality tag also appears to have been added simply to provide as many 'complain' boxes as possible.--Jeffro77 (talk) 11:28, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Summary: Jeffro says, "my text is better quality than what I've removed."

Good for you, that's just the way you should feel. But you'd be safer in that feeling if you'd asked for feedback first. It's early days for your text I'd imagine, so these are just something to work on:

• it is OR—it includes vague and arbitrary descriptions of some so-called "Unitarian" group that doesn't appear in the literature, and who seem to believe in multiple divine persons, strange for a group called Unitarian;
• it weasles Trinitarianism by giving undue weight to alternative POVs, yet fails to articulate any coherent alternative POV;
• it is POV and contains FUD—masculine language normally means reference to masculinity; extreme minority views that use sophistry to obfuscate such basic facts are injected as though worthy of notice in a summary.

Whatever Jeffro is describing currently bears little resemblance to landmark statements of faith debated over 2,000 years of Christian literature. Please let me know when you think you've got things to a standard that Christians and Trinitarians will accept as a fair reflection of their positions, and I trust I'll be able to confirm your hard work has produced a quality result. Alastair Haines (talk) 15:00, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Of course I believe my text is better, and for specific reasons. Mainly, what was there previously basically said 'Christians argued about a Trinity a long time ago, which isn't really relevant, and now back to the article'.

You speak as though I've simply made up the term Unitarian, though it refers to an existing article, and is referenced; and non-trinitarianism is also mentioned.

The article is about 'gender of God', not debates about the Trinity, which will drag the article out of scope (again). Any implied 'weaseling' is justified by the fact that a very large majority of Christians are Trinitarian, and some aren't. An exhaustive list of religions holding these positions would be impractical due to length and article scope. If you can improve the article, do so. But the import is there, and is much better than merely talking about debates about Christianity that were not about the topic of this article.

To reiterate, this article is not about the Trinity. The article should provide a basic outline of the existing positions, and provide the various views relating to the gender of God. If people want to learn more about the Trinity, or nontrinitarianism or Unitarians or bunnies, they can refer to the relevant articles.--Jeffro77 (talk) 16:55, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Sloppy Theology

Whoever is rewriting the Christian section needs to do some theology 101. ELEMENTS as a synonym for persons?!? I don't have time to police this, but will someone bring in an editor with at least basic Christian theological understanding to help Alastair out? This is ridiculous. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 13:15, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't see the problem. It's not being used as a synonym of person, it's being used to reference their relationship with the whole. They're elements of a trinity in the same way that they're members of a set. This isn't theology, it's just English. Ilkali (talk) 13:43, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Dripping with condescension, SkyWriter's comment barely merits any response at all. Thanks Ilkali for pointing out logic.--Jeffro77 (talk) 17:11, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Ilkali, elements denotes a complex unity of components. The Trinity is a simplex unity with no component parts. "Elements" denotes a tritheistic unity, such as in the Mormon religion, which is completely incompatible with Christian theology, which has been explicitly defined to preclude such a designation. As the Westminster Confession of Faith states, "God has no body, parts, or passions." I noted also that the same editor put the maleness of the human nature of Jesus into the lede pertaining to the maleness vs. masculinity of God. The human nature of Jesus in Christian theology shares no attributes with the divine nature. These are extremely basic to Christianity and unworthy mistakes of a resource that is supposed to have the caliber that Wikipedia claims to have. Let's be more careful, shall we? SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 14:06, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

The statement, "the same editor put the maleness of the human nature of Jesus into the lede" is also completely false. I added the word 'element'. User:Abtract modified the lead. Get your facts straight please.--Jeffro77 (talk) 17:18, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

If you have a better word than 'elements', provide one instead of just whinging.--Jeffro77 (talk) 17:11, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Tim, I've got another idea. How about we leave them alone for a while, nobody was looking over our shoulders when we wrote essays at college. Jeffro might actually be making an attempt to rewrite the article, that's fine, let's give him a month, or as long as he wants, and then he can call for reviews when he's ready. It doesn't matter what good text gets removed, it's all still in the article history, it can be restored at any time. If Jeffro wants to write the article, that's fine, we know how much reading is involved in doing that well, we need to give him a chance to do it. He can't listen to sources, if he has to listen to us all the time. If he doesn't want help, that just means a holiday for us. What do you think? Alastair Haines (talk) 14:35, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

The statement, "It doesn't matter what good text gets removed," is misleading - the only thing I've removed was about debates about the Trinity, which are out of the article's scope; the other part was merely moved to the intro paragraph with some rewording.--Jeffro77 (talk) 17:11, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Then apparently the discussion is over whether members of a "simplex unity" can be described as elements of the whole. I'd say: Yeah, sure. Ilkali (talk) 14:52, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Ilkali, the concept of "trinity" isn't that difficult in the real world. A billiard ball is spatially triune, and yet (to the naked eye) a simplex unity. The dimensions are not compositional parts that can be divided. Eliminate one dimension and you do not have 2/3s of a billiard ball's mass, but rather 0/3s. People get confused sometimes with personal dimensions, rather than spatial dimensions, but that is not a problem with the concept of triunity, but rather with the concept of person -- hence the often stated "technical" aspect of the word person, which is only an approximation of the word the church fathers debated. And yes, that discussion is over, and has been for 1600 years now.

That said, Alastair, once again you bring a note of sanity to everyone's troubles here. Yes, I don't have the time and desperately need to disengage. Yes, Jeffro is taking this as an opportunity. And yes, we should let him develop what he can on his own, and come back later for a peer review. To be sure, the beginning efforts had some whoppers, but we've made him aware of the fact that it is a learning curve for a beginner, and as a responsible editor we should give him a chance to do his homework, now that he knows some is required.

Just because I didn't add references at 6a.m. before going to bed does not give you the right to be condescnding. What was in the intro of the Christianity section previously was woefully out of scope. I have provided a starting point for an introduction that brings the issue into scope while mentioning the existing positions within Christianity. If you can improve it, do so. The inapproparite tone of your comments ('we should let him', 'we've made him aware', 'for a beginner', 'we should give him a chance', 'now that he knows') is also noted.--Jeffro77 (talk) 17:11, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I'll take this page off of my watchlist for a month. If I forget to check back in, please drop me a note.

Best of luck, Jeffro. Remember:

1. Christianity is a human subject, and as such has been subjected to analysis by some of the best minds in history. As arguments against Christian doctrine are well thought out and sophisticated, so too are those doctrines themselves.
2. Paradigms often appear to be nonsense from the outside, and yet are elegantly consistent from the inside. You have your work cut out for you.
3. If something looks too easy -- you may not be looking at it right.
4. Elegance doesn't make something true, but lack of elegance in your analysis may indicate that you aren't looking at "it" truly. Whether Christianity is true or not, it is not silly -- no great human philosophy is. We should take them seriously, grapple with them, and attempt to present even "false" philosophies authentically.

Again, good luck, and thank Alastair for saving us from more battles for a month. Lord knows we both need it! SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 15:31, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Looking forward to seeing the fruits of sustained, committed, sourced, neutral, open-to-criticism improvements to the page while we get out of everyone's way. Show us what you can do! Merry Christmas everyone! Alastair Haines (talk) 15:47, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Arbitrary sub-section break

I think the rewrite of the Christianity section is a great idea. It makes sense to organise information by topic (views about the trinity, views by non-trinitarian groups, views about God that are independent of trinitarianism/non-trinitarianism) rather than by specific denominations of Christianity.

I would like to find a way to merge some of the "Other Variations" section into the main parts of the Christianity section. Some of it is about views on the Holy Spirit, and the rest of it is about inclusive language in Protestant churches. The Holy Spirit stuff could go into the Trinity section next to Syriacs and Gnostics, and then perhaps the "Other" section could be renamed.

Thoughts? --Alynna (talk) 00:00, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

I also previously thought about the Protestant section as maybe warranting its own section, but it didn't seem quite uniform and distinct enough to call it anything specific, because it's about a minority of Protestant groups rather than anything representative of Protestantism generally.

The problem with dividing purely between Trinitarian and nontrinitarian is that there are some views shared by both (e.g. most in both groups believe God to be male), and there are differences among groups within each (e.g. the minor Protestant views compared to other Trinitarian views; Seventh-Day Adventist's concept of the Holy Spirit as male compared with Jehovah's Witnesses view that the Holy Spirit is not a person). These examples are not exhaustive. That said, the article does lend toward such a distinction, in that gender of 'the Son' and of 'the Holy Spirit' is much more relevant with regard to the Trinity. However, this distinction has been used previously to develop slippery-slope arguments regarding the status of nontrinitarians as Christians (specifically, whereby editors had changed the heading levels so that non-mainstream religions aren't included within Christianity at all, eg [2]), which should be guarded against.

Additionally, I won't continue to tolerate the demonstrated attitude of some editors here who seem to feel that they are the 'big boys' who 'let' their 'inferiors' edit the article.--Jeffro77 (talk) 00:48, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Confused of wikipedia

Just a suggestion from a "man on the Clapham omnibus" ("ordinary Joe" for our American friends) ... it seems to me that most of the vast discussion above is theological rather than encyclopedic. If we (you) stood back and voided our minds of Christian (may his holy name be blessed) thoughts and concentrated on what would help readers/customers/students (whatever) understand how various religions/sects dealt with the gender of their God/Gods/god/gods, there might be a small chance that this article could be useful in some way other than as a battle ground for sectarian differences. Worrying about how many angels might dance on the head of the definitional pin surely cannot advance this cause (one that you/we all espouse). To this end, I have a suggestion ... let's take a trinitarian approach and ask three independent folk to decide on the section headings; I will nominate one (genuinely quite outside this debate) and two others by ... sadly I do not know who are the "sides" but presumably you do. Ah well, it filled a moment after my first phase test. Abtract (talk) 18:00, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

A problem with the Gender in Bible translation article

See the Gender in Bible translation article. That article's title states that it is about gender in Bible translations. But much of that text was really cut and pasted from this article, Gender of God. There are three problems with this:

• this text was not solely about Bible translations. It was also about translations of God's name in Siddurim, Jewish prayer books - and also in Christian prayerbooks.

• the text originally was focused on translating Hebrew names of God into English, not about translating all gender terms in general.

• The Gender of God article, this one, now has few examples of what it supposed to be talking about, now that so much text has been removed from it.

I thus will be restoring some of the text within this article back into the main article, and wish to hear from other editors about what we should do with that other article. Rename it? Rewrite it? Split it into two articles? (Perhaps creating a Gender of God in prayerbooks article?) RK (talk) 17:34, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Oh, good catch. I'm pretty sure it was just about Bibles when I split it off ages ago... but whatever. Maybe a Gender in translation of names of God article, or something? Or if there's a few sentences to say about Jewish or Christian prayerbooks, throw them in this article... But if there's a ton, probably make it its own article. --Alynna (talk) 17:43, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

About Alastair's proposed text

If I may offer a thought: I agree with much of what Alastair writes vis-a-vis certain topics in this article. I think, however, the problem is that these contributions are in the wrong Wikipedia entry. In other words, the other editors here who have come to a consensus not to include this material are correct about not placing that particular text within this particular article. Yet Alistair is correct about the need to have these clarifications somewhere within Wikipedia articles.

The real problem seems to be one I have seen years ago on Wikipedia, back when I was a very active editor & contributor. Too many topics began to develop, in too much depth, for all of it to make sense within just one article. As such, we started splitting articles up into a series of related articles. Given what the consensus is for other articles, I think we should have the same sort of distinction in Gender of God. I thus agree with the majority of other editors that the gender of God article is already covering many topics. In line with what we do elsewhere, whenever possible we briefly discuss an issue, and link to the appropriate article which discusses that point in more depth. I don't wish for anyone to think that I don't value Alstair's contributions; I just am agreeing with the editorial consensus on what should be found within this article. RK (talk) 17:21, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree. Text defining gender should go at gender. Text defining God should go at God. That's what internal links, and multiple articles, are for. --Alynna (talk) 18:55, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

A further note: When this text was originally added, there was ongoing debate about whether this article should cover all religions, or only monotheistic and henotheistic ones. Defining "God" was partly an attempt to clear that up. Since that time, the intro has been rewritten to include all religions. Which is great. But it means we should revisit the inclusion of a definition of "God", since all these religions define "God" slightly differently.

I think somewhere it was also mentioned that part of the reason for including a dictionary definition of "God"/"god" was to show that it was a masculine word in English. That might actually be relevant to this article, although I'm not sure it needs its own top-level section. Perhaps the section on Christianity could note that Christians often refer to their deity as just "God", and what that implies (or doesn't) about Christian beliefs on God's gender.

As far as the definition of gender, I think that's been rendered largely moot by the intro, which explains that we could be talking either about literal biological sex, in the case of deities believed to have physical bodies, or about something more metaphorical.

Thoughts? --Alynna (talk) 23:00, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

My previous comment was intended to be part of this discussion, not a new discussion on article scope. I've made a copy so we can have both discussions. I'd like to keep this section on the narrow topic of the text that's been the recent subject of an edit war, with the hope of achieving consensus. Thanks, Alynna (talk) 23:58, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

The text in question appears relatively concise, notable, well sourced, and pertinent. Since "god" and "gender" are terms people don't usually think of together, clarifying the terms is particularly helpful. People come to this article with their own theological and gender baggage, and something that seems unnecessary to some will be extremely necessary to others. This seems to be one of those necessities.EGMichaels (talk) 02:14, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh, look at that. Someone completely new shows up to agree with Alastair within 48 hours of him reopening the issue, on a talk page that had otherwise been dormant for months.

Look, doubts about your neutrality aside, you still haven't established consensus for inclusion of this material, which has been challenged by several editors. Ilkali (talk) 09:21, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm not neutral at all: I have a beef with reliable sourced information being deleted. Move it to a better place, update the references, but don't just delete it. EGMichaels (talk) 13:23, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

If material doesn't belong in an article, it should be removed. The opinion of several editors is that this material is not sufficiently related to the gender of God and better belongs in the God and Gender articles. If Alastair (or anybody else) wants to introduce it there then so be it, but no editor is required to do so. You should not be inserting heavily-contested material without discussion. Ilkali (talk) 14:11, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

"Gender" and "God" don't belong in "Gender of God." I'm not sure that even qualifies as POV. It doesn't even make sense. There's some other kind of bias at work here. Did I stumble into some kind of personal contest?EGMichaels (talk) 15:43, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Laborious, essay-like discussions of gender and God don't belong in Gender of God. We already have articles defining those terms. Ilkali (talk) 17:11, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Two paragraphs is hardly laborious. Is there another reason you haven't stated?EGMichaels (talk) 18:55, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

A lot of editors seem to disagree with you. Are you going to say they're all biased, or are you going to stop insulting them? Ilkali (talk) 19:47, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

That was a simple question. I'll repeat it. Two paragraphs is hardly laborious. Is there another reason you haven't stated? You seem way too intent on those two little paragraphs. I've stated my own bias (and only the most biased editors would deny they have one). My bias leans in favor of sourced information. If it is misplaced, moving is better than removing. If it isn't well sourced, better sourcing is better than deletion. We are trying to build an encyclopedia here rather than vandalize everyone else's work. Concision isn't removal, but rather better organization. There -- you've seen my bias. Now, what is yours?EGMichaels (talk) 20:21, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

"If it is misplaced, moving is better than removing". Moving is just removing plus inserting. I'll handle the removing, you deal with the putting-it-somewhere-else. If somebody added a few paragraphs on bees here, I would do the same thing: Remove it and advise the person to take it to a better venue. I'm under no obligation to do anything more. Ilkali (talk) 10:12, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

What is the scope of this article?

A further note: When this text was originally added, there was ongoing debate about whether this article should cover all religions, or only monotheistic and henotheistic ones. Defining "God" was partly an attempt to clear that up. Since that time, the intro has been rewritten to include all religions. Which is great. But it means we should revisit the inclusion of a definition of "God", since all these religions define "God" slightly differently.

I think somewhere it was also mentioned that part of the reason for including a dictionary definition of "God"/"god" was to show that it was a masculine word in English. That might actually be relevant to this article, although I'm not sure it needs its own top-level section. Perhaps the section on Christianity could note that Christians often refer to their deity as just "God", and what that implies (or doesn't) about Christian beliefs on God's gender.

As far as the definition of gender, I think that's been rendered largely moot by the intro, which explains that we could be talking either about literal biological sex, in the case of deities believed to have physical bodies, or about something more metaphorical.

Thoughts? --Alynna (talk) 23:00, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Whoah, this is not what I expected. When this article was first created, and for at least two years later, it was understood by all involved that it was solely about the Judeo-Christian concept(s) of God, and arguably also about closely related concepts, such as God in Unitarian-Universalism, and even Islam. It was never about all other faiths, or other concepts of God. Now I see why this article has become so contentious. The scope was widened to cover too many concepts!

I suggest taking a look back at the original Wikipedia article on God. When that article was first made, it also was understood by all involved that it was solely about the Jewish, Christian and Muslim concept(s) of God (and also arguably also about closely related concepts.) However, as time passed too many cooks threw too many ingredients into that article, and for a time it grew to encompass every conception of Deity you could imagine. In the fairness it became an unmanageable mess. Over time a new consensus grew: good encyclopedia articles are about well defined topics, not everything! God was thus split from Deity and Polytheism, and various articles related to God developed. We need to have that same discipline here. No one article can or should cover all theological concepts of the divine, deities, gods, God, etc. RK (talk) 23:34, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I think there's a place for both types of articles, broad and narrow.

Gender of God can give an overview of what different religions think about the gender of their main deities. (Granted, it maybe ought to be renamed "gender of deities" or something, to reflect that it's not just about the entity described in God.) More importantly, it can also cover cross-religion topics (such as "Is there any relationship between gender equality in a culture and the gender of its deities?" I'm sure someone has written about that.) and broad trends (such as "more recent religions tend to have more male gods", if that happens to be true).

Gender of God in Christianity (and parallel articles for other religions, if we decide to write them) can go into detail on Christian beliefs on the gender of the Judeo-Christian conception of God. A lot of what can be said about a specific conception of God relies on the traditions of a single religion.

I'm ambivalent on whether there should be an article on the gender of God across Abrahamic religions. --Alynna (talk) 00:15, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Proposal: archiving sections on this talk page

The following sections above look like they are no longer active. Would anyone object to moving them to Archive 4? This would make current discussions easier to read.

I won't archive any section unless there's been no objection after 7 days. (That makes the 25th the earliest I would archive anything.)

• Clarifying terms: Gender of God (This topic has a more recent discussion in "About Alastair's proposed text".)
• Pick our battles
• Proof Texting and Spoof Texting
• Language v doctrine
• Too many sections
• Changed Christianity section
• Confused of wikipedia

--Alynna (talk) 23:05, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree that we should create this new archive, but not quite yet. Most of that discussion is still pretty recent. Maybe wait until April 09, and then place most of the current material in a new archive. Whenever possible the Talk page should cover the last few months of discussion. RK (talk) 23:36, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Repeated actions by Alastair

Alastair, stop putting in this clearly off-topic material. Stop trying to take ownership of this page. There is an editorial consensus about what should be here, and most of it concerns material that has been here literally for years. You are trying to rewrite this article into something that it is not, and you show no willingness to work with others. You don't seem to understand what this article is supposed to be about. If you persist in your actions we will be forced to protect the page. RK (talk) 13:22, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

First warning for incivility. Blatantly untrue personal attacks will no longer be tolerated. I'll be restoring this page at a later date. If you have any content questions, you are of course free to be specific about content challenges in talk page discussion. Alastair Haines (talk) 04:24, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh, Alastair. I really wish you could just let it go. Ilkali (talk) 08:19, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

<pulls up a chair and munches some popcorn> -Lisa (talk) 15:11, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

LoL! Neat comment Lisa.

Within 4 hours Ilkali demonstrates his personal attack reflex and inability to let go.

Reliable sources do not stay deleted while I maintain pages, unless better ones or reasons are offered which gain consensus.

But I'm still on holiday, sorry, no entertainment Lisa. Alastair Haines (talk) 15:15, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

"Within 4 hours Ilkali demonstrates his personal attack reflex and inability to let go". Hoo boy. Let's just walk past that one.

"Reliable sources do not stay deleted while I maintain pages". No single editor dictates what happens on a page. Macho posturing has little effect here. Either accept the consensus or seek to change it. Ilkali (talk) 16:29, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Consensus means that everyone agrees. obviously Alastair and others don't agree. So Ikali is advocating a non-consensus view. Ikali why are you dictating a nonconsensus view? perhaps for POV? Wouldn't it be great if Ikali and Lisaliel actually tried to get a consensus? However they aren't interested in documented references only their POV.75.119.152.81 (talk) 19:20, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Another new editor appears to champion Alastair's cause? How very coincidental!

I have never claimed that everybody agrees. What I have claimed is that there is strong opposition to introducing Alastair's material. There is a double standard here; Alastair (and his clones) claim that consensus is needed to remove the material, but deny that consensus is needed to introduce it. There was never consensus for its inclusion. Ilkali (talk) 19:39, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

The more the merrier. The more we raise a fuss here the more people will show up. See what you started Ilkali? Now -- I'm open to placing things in better locations, rewording them, or upgrading them. Flat out deletion is just poor form unless the information is flat wrong. Is the information wrong, or does it simply need work?EGMichaels (talk) 20:23, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

"The more we raise a fuss here the more people will show up". Yes, because Alastair will just invite more of his friends to help him. Ilkali (talk) 10:08, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Montheism

Why this page links to montheism, which redirects to monotheism? Is there some difference between those two? 91.152.71.13 (talk) 17:10, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Montheism is an aberrant spelling of monotheism. There is no difference between the two. --^StormRider 17:32, 7 March 2009 (UTC)