Talk:Church of the Nativity

Arabs?
The 2002 siege has nothnig to do with the article about the basilica. One can put is it an article about Paletinians under occupation or similar. I have removed this part.

Yankale — Preceding unsigned comment added by Yankale (talk • contribs) 14:08, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Did the "armed Arab militants" actually take over the church, or were they just seeking sanctuary?

Were civilians free to come and go? Or:
 * Did the armed militants prevent civilians from leaving?
 * Did the Israeli soldiers prevent civilians from leaving?

What is the definition of a siege?

Ed Poor


 * Well, there's a definition at the siege article. I think the Israelis were trying to win by attrition. On a separate note, it wouldn't hurt to document how the standoff ended and the condition of the church following. There should also be more on the church's early history. Wesley


 * Yes, more than half of the article should be about the church and its history, rather than the takeover and standoff. And since you probably know more about the building than I do (hint, hint)... --Ed Poor

Is this article's neutrality still disputed, or can the disclaimer be deleted? Tokerboy 22:39 Oct 17, 2002 (UTC)


 * "The church became famous briefly as the third millennium began" can someone find a better sentence ? It was already famous !

Ericd 18:23, 12 Sep 2003 (UTC)


 * I changed it to read "The church was in the news briefly," which seems more accurate and doesn't discount its extensicve history. --oknazevad 16:00, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * I had forgotten this comment... In retrospect this makes me think to John Lennon. What do you think about "the church became more famous than Jesus Christ" ? Ericd 16:07, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Funny, but frankly a bit too funny and unscholarly for an encyclopedia. Still, I give you high marks for humor.--oknazevad 20:25, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

term "terrorist" removed to establish the neutrality of the article


 * Not even sure if "terrorist" isn't neutral, but besides the point. Not justification to incorrectly state a link's title. --Patrick80639 17:40, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Excommunication of World Leaders
I have taken out the following material, as there is no source cited and it clearly isn't accurate even if there is a true story behind it (the Church of the Nativity is a building so it can't excommunicate anyone). If anyone can come up with a sourced and factually accurate version feel free to put a mention of it into the article, at more proportionate length. Palmiro | Talk 15:30, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

The Church of Nativity decided on Sunday, March 30, 2003, to excommunicate U.S. President Bush,  Rumsfeld,  Blair and  Straw due to their  military attacks on Iraq. This act effectively bans these world leaders from stepping foot on the sacred grounds the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem.

A spokesman for the Orthodox Church of Jerusalem, archimandrite Attallah Hanna, said that the excommunication decision is only a means to express disapproval and strong condemnation of what is currently going on in Iraq. It is also an expression of the Church’s sympathy with the Iraqi people.

Hanna described both Bush and Blair as having turned a deaf ear to several calls by the Orthodox Church and other churches before war erupted. “This indicates that leaders of the invading states did not listen to the church, and hence, we deem them excommunicates and perverted.”

With this radical act the Church of Nativity made an example of itself, as it is the first church on earth and has a special importance for different Christian sects.

✅ VVVladimir (talk) 16:46, 5 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Just a little note: when one says that a church did this or that, it doesn't literally mean that the church building did that (which is absurd), but the people associated with that church. VVVladimir (talk) 17:16, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Re-Work
I've done some major re-working of the article with regard to format, adding info and pics. I'd appreciate any further input anyone can make, esp. regarding the Church of St. Catherine (for instance, why is it named for St. Catherine?) and any architectural details that might be informative and relevant. Also, does anyone have a suggestion for a better heading than ==Compound==? I thought it was better than the previous one, but only mildly so. By the way, if anyone has access to one, a better picture of Manger Square would be nice. MishaPan 09:06, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I visited The Church of Nativity in March 2012 and was fascinated by Crusader mosaics. I have two images (one not very clear) but I believe they consitiute an interesting mix of Romanesque and Byzantine styles. In addition I feel their colouring is not unlike the mosaics in The Great Mosque, Damascus. Mcdougz 23:03 14 May 2012 (BST) —Preceding undated comment added 22:04, 14 May 2012 (UTC).

Armenian celebration
I recall that Armenians usually celebrate Christmas on January 6 worldwide, but the article doesn't mention this as the date they celebrate in Bethlehem. Anybody know? Crushti (talk) 00:52, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Paragraphs
UNESCO thought the subject was notable for its historical value. This article puts more emphasis on UNESCO and the occupation than the history that UNESCO thought was important. 71.35.143.113 (talk) 06:42, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

World Heritage section is too long
Suggest we shorten the World Heritage section to something along the lines of my attempted change that was undone:. The section is simply growing too long in comparison to the article itself, and it probably warrants a new article on its own. Thoughts? Hiberniantears (talk) 18:51, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Indeed. Please show some respect to a holly place, and leave your politics out. It is of concern to no one, and if so, some other place please. Ori (talk) 21:51, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Does any fact deserve to be mentioned? Don't you reckon you are over doing it with so much information that is superfluous and which doesn't deal with the church at all? Ori (talk) 21:58, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
 * agreed with Hiberniantears, but can we wait till its off ITN. Ill be the first then to suppor tit.
 * btw- Ori, please keep your personal biases out of the encycopaedia. This is nothing to do with "show some respect" if that was the case there would not be any cartoon/religious articles and articles about negation of any religion and neither with Virgin Killers image be on here. It is of concern that the site if a World Heritage Monument and even when its moved to another article a short and brief mention should and will in likelyhood get consensus to be here.(Lihaas (talk) 22:02, 30 June 2012 (UTC)).
 * Please note UNESCO decision is only acc. articles 4 and 6. Never be too sure of anything Ori (talk) 22:04, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Corrected that.
 * Also created Church of the Nativity - World Heritage Site as theres not naming precedenct...though we can go with Church of the Nativity (World Heritage Site)(Lihaas (talk) 22:15, 30 June 2012 (UTC)).
 * Looks good. Not sure what the best naming convention is for the new article, but you're on the right path. Hiberniantears (talk) 00:01, 1 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Lets leave it as such still someone objects ;)(Lihaas (talk) 08:07, 1 July 2012 (UTC)).

Merge proposal

 * Closure see below. – Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:40, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

I propose that Church of the Nativity (World Heritage Site) be merged here as the information is more or less duplicated, and the Church of the Nativity article can hold all pertinent information, after a major trim. I can't imaging having Borobudur and Borobudur (World Heritage Site). — Crisco 1492 (talk) 13:40, 2 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Support Indeed redundant. Consider trimming most of the inormation. Regards.-- GoP T C N 14:41, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Oppose The article on World Heritage status is intended to be an article on the political event of granting the status, rather than on the church itself. Since this landmark was granted status in a manner that differs from most other landmarks, inclusion within the actual article on the church was creating a situation wherein the section on World Heritage status was growing considerably longer than the other sections of the article. Granted, a clearer name for the new article is warranted for clarity's sake. Hiberniantears (talk) 15:07, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Then explain what is so significant about the latter? It is full of quotes and disputes. Regards.-- GoP T C N 15:50, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
 * It was the first Palestine site under high controversy. NOT the Palestinian Territories or State of Palestine.Lihaas (talk) 18:50, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Let's be clear, this is to have an article on the church, and an article on a political event about the church. That's entirely normal on Wikipedia. That the new article is currently in a state that duplicates material from the main article just means there is some cleanup to be done. I think folks are being hasty here. Give it a week or two. Hiberniantears (talk) 01:52, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
 * "Give it a week or two." for more POV comments, unrelated to the building itself? Regards.-- GoP T C N 13:46, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Folks are hung up on the original attempt being poorly executed. So yes, give it a week or two for this "collaborative" encyclopedia to work at building the new article into something better than a POV fork. Hiberniantears (talk) 14:59, 5 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Support Merge after trimming. It is redundant imho. This would require to duplicate all WHS sites that had a controversial nomination.  Alberto Fernandez Fernandez (talk) 16:54, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Support, meaningless, very redundant, a separate article should never have been created. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 17:04, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Merge after trimming. New article holds tons of superfluous information. I think the inclusion of the site as a WHS is not such a big deal. Ori (talk) 17:29, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
 * It was moved because of YOU. the bid information and the reaction are what makes this notable and, more so for the former as encyclopaedic...in stark contrast to the personal objections you asserted.Lihaas (talk) 18:54, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
 * oppose while i previously was not as supportive (above section), this is better as the encyclopaedic detailo f the bid, etc is far too long to post on the article of the church...as would be that of the siege 10 years ago
 * Also note the nominator blindly asserts OSE as a reasonLihaas (talk) 18:50, 2 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Support merge: I don't know what happened to my previous vote/comment, but I find it confusing having two articles about the same subject. -- Another Believer ( Talk ) 23:48, 2 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Support Merge. Until there is enough material to warrent to different articles, there should not be two. Please focus energy of improving the article that already exists. Eagletennis (talk) 20:15, 6 July 2012 (UTC)


 * In addition to some cleanup, would this be a worthwhile change? Hiberniantears (talk) 02:02, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
 * REMINDER WP:OSE is not a valid arguement. Because other WHS' have no such page, sdoesnt mean everyone should no.Lihaas (talk) 10:46, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Then explain in a neutral point of view what is so special about this page? Why not simply cut it down and merge the most important parts? -- GoP T C N 13:39, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
 * An illustrative example is not OSE, especially when the rationale was clearly stated "the information is more or less duplicated" in both articles. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 04:14, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

I just posted this at the other article, but I'm not sure which Talk page people are watching, so I'll add it here too. I made some important changes this morning that should clear up the confusion. To try and clear up some of the NPOV concerns, I moved the article to "Church of the Nativity World Heritage Site Controversy". This article was never intended to be about "the Church of the Nativity that is a World Heritage Site". Instead, this is supposed to be an article on the event of granting World Heritage Site status to the Church of the Nativity. Everything about the building should be at Church of the Nativity, whereas this new article should be about the political events of the UNESCO decision. This is, simply put, an article about a news event that happens to feature the church as a MacGuffin, no different from Siege of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. Hiberniantears (talk) 16:29, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
 * That's a bit more encyclopedic, although I still think it just warrants a section here. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:06, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. Please note that Other Stuff Exists is a deletion discussion issue — having a content fork here is not a good idea anyway, and its bad-idea status is highlighted by the fact that no other WHS has followed it.  Nyttend (talk) 16:09, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Closure
In conclusion of the discussion, and observing the further development (or lack thereof) of the new article after the time this discussion was started, I am closing the above merge proposal as consensus to merge, including a strong recommendation to trim the merged content considerably. In merging, editors should also keep in mind that Wikipedia is WP:NOTNEWS, so there is no need to include lengthy literal quotations from multiple observers. There is also the issue of avoiding WP:COATRACK material, i.e. discussion that is more concerned with Palestinian UNESCO membership in general than with the actual church. I'll leave the implementation of the merge to editors of these pages, but my personal recommendation would be to start with something that might be as brief as the following rough-and-dirty sketch:


 * In June 2012, the church was listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. It was the first listing of a site in the Palestinian territories, made after an application of the Palestinian authorities, and came eight months after Palestine had been admitted as a full member of UNESCO. The listing was approved after a fast-track, emergency candidacy, which was requested by the Palestinian delegation on the grounds of urgent needs of restoration of the site. The decision to list the church as a World Heritage Site was met with political reactions from various sides. Palestinian representatives greeted the decision as an important signal towards international recognition of Palestinian sovereignty. Representatives of Israel and the USA, which had been opposed to the Palestinian UNESCO membership, voiced disapproval of the decision and described it as politically motivated.

Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:40, 11 July 2012 (UTC)


 * I concur. Hiberniantears (talk) 00:59, 12 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Inspite of the above decision, one Lihaas is insisting on restoring the article Church of the Nativity World Heritage Site Controversy. I would suggest he accepted the common decision. Thanks, Ori (talk) 09:11, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

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Size Constantinian church
I have removed some nonsense (Constantinian church consisting of two courtyards [!!!] and a rotunda), updated the reconstruction (enclosed broken pentagonal apse, no quasi-freestanding octagonal tower-like rotunda). Previous quotations were given w/o URL; if (!) still valid, the measures can be reintroduced by whoever has access. Thanks,  Arminden (talk) 11:07, 8 April 2018 (UTC)

= Justinian's basilica (565) =

In a single sentence the paragraph credits the 2nd church to Justinian without giving any quotes or other forms of proof. While it's correct that the 2nd church was for a long time credited to him by historians, the theory is not undisputed anymore. Several articles mention, that the church may be built by him or may be build even earlier. As far as I know, there is actually no historical source crediting the church to Justinian. --131.220.244.26 (talk) 14:17, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Represent competing views?

 * The holy site known as the Nativity Grotto is thought to be the cave in which Jesus was born. In 135, Emperor Hadrian had the site above the grotto converted into a worship place for Adonis, the mortal lover of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of beauty and desire. Jerome claimed in 420 that the grotto had been consecrated to the worship of Adonis, and that a sacred grove was planted there in order to completely wipe out the memory of Jesus from the world.

This is the current, dominant narrative. But the cult of Tammuz had been in the region for at least seven centuries, and sacred caves have had a very long relationship with paganism, with caves long being associated with the birth canal of the Earth Mother. This notion that the grotto was converted to pagan worship after the birth of Jesus is highly suspect. Viriditas (talk) 09:36, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

Helena's role
The Bethlehem article states that "The Church of the Nativity was built at her initiative." . In this article it's her who identifies the place.

I know people love their female deities and saints, but this seems highly dubious. This was an imperial project, Constantine had embarked on a state-(re)building initiative, with Christianity as the new state religion, and therefore needed to raise the new holy sites to the rank and fame held until then by temples like those in Rome, Athens, Delos, Ephesus etc. After Jerusalem, Bethlehem, already adopted into Christian "holy geography" since at least the 2nd c., was an obvious candidate for an imperial church. The theological argument (pophecy of the Messiah coming from the "house of David") had its own weight. Bishop Makarios knew for sure about the site and was corresponding with the emperor.

'''How plausible is Helena's role, beyond the pious legend? Which are the ancient sources, and how are they regarded by modern scholars?'''

N.b.: clerics, even if widely recognised as scholars, such as R. Brownrigg and J. Murphy-O'Connor, are unlikely to go against fundamental narratives of the Church. Secular scholars seem to me more credible in such contexts. Arminden (talk) 23:20, 14 May 2024 (UTC)