Talk:El Shaddai (song)

Hymnbooks / congregational use
OK, someone has added a citation needed tag. I know from personal experience that it has been included in a number of hymnbooks (but don't have copies) and have been in churches when it's been sung, But that's hardly authoritative or verifiable. I've found an entry in someone's blog confirming both these facts, but I don't think that would be sufficient. Any idea how best to handle this? Sidefall 00:11, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Minor edits and requests for expansion
I've done some slight editing to this article - most particularly rearranging the lead section to mention the songwriters first, which I think gives them due credit and results in a more accurate and balanced article. A few questions that I'd like to see answered:


 * Was it originally written for Amy Grant?
 * Which of Michael Card's first two albums (First Light and Legacy) was it recorded on?
 * How did it come to be occasionally used congregationally?
 * I would guess that, for many Christians, it was and still is the only contact they have had with the Hebrew language. Can anyone elaborate on this? Can the song be related to the development of the hebrew roots and messianic jewish movements? I'd be very interested in some contextual background - causes and effects of the song.

I would also agree with the unsigned comment below regarding the authority of an external reference. I am not a sufficient hebrew expert to be able to offer an opinion - I've left the article unchanged, but I will add a cautionary note.

Sidefall 09:21, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

"I pity you, God"??
This doesn't seem to be supported by the source. Though it is apparently a rather odd use of the word, it is used in Psalms by David to express love to God. That is all, of course, assuming the source can be trusted at all, which I would like to call into question. It's a geocities site by a user named "Demonobsession666" who appears to have a number of satanic and/or cultic things on his site (e.g. http://www.geocities.com/demonobsession666/occultcrime.html). I believe that this would definitely put him well outside the boundaries of NPOV...


 * The exact stem (Binyan) and consonantal root combination seen in 'Erħam k a at Psalms 18:2 is a hapax legomenon in the Biblical text, so it's difficult to say with absolute certainty what it means, but the general root R-Ħ-M has meanings "mercy, compassion, love" (but not romantic love). See R-H-M for the analogous Arabic. AnonMoos 11:41, 25 May 2007 (UTC)


 * So, in context, it seems to me the best translation is "Merciful Lord". --68.35.127.124 (talk) 01:32, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:El Shaddai.ogg
Image:El Shaddai.ogg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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BetacommandBot 11:20, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

other languages
Versions with other second languages than English should be mentioned. At least Spanish, French, Russian and German recordings do exist. --Ikar.us (talk) 20:10, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Dead external links to Allmusic website – December 2010
Since Allmusic have changed the syntax of their URLs, 1 link(s) used in the article do not work anymore and can't be migrated automatically. Please use the search option on http://www.allmusic.com to find the new location of the linked Allmusic article(s) and fix the link(s) accordingly. If a new location cannot be found, the link(s) should be removed. This applies to the following external links: --CactusBot (talk) 12:27, 31 December 2010 (UTC) --Cactus26 (talk) 16:40, 2 January 2011 (UTC)
 * http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?P=amg&sql=B26bsa9igb23u

External links modified
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External links modified
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Proposed for deletion
I have nominated this for deletion because, as summarized in my request, there are a lack of sources with actual content, with a lot of original research to top it all off. It simply does not belong. NowIsntItTime(chats)(doings) 04:06, 24 October 2019 (UTC)
 * It was a Billboard Christian No. 1 and other charts at No. 1 when it was released in 1982. Current sourcing is never a reason to delete any article. Walter Görlitz (talk) 04:43, 24 October 2019 (UTC)
 * It won the Gospel Music Association Dove Award for Song of the Year the year after its release. Unfortunately, https://doveawards.com/awards/past-winners/ does not allow direct linking of search results, so you have to search for it. Hard to find (or know) for a song in this under-reported genre and that makes WP:BEFORE difficult if not impossible. A lot of details in . Amy Grant's entry is seven pages long and the song gets the following:
 * "'Sing Your Praise to the Lord' … and 'El Shaddai' (written by Michael Card and John Thompson) are rightly regarded as Christian classics, and Grant's definitive renditions of the songs served to jump-start the careers of their composers…. In 1998, Grant's version of 'El Shaddai' was chosen in a CCM poll of thirty critics as the second-best 'contemporary Christian song of all time' (behind [Michael W.] Smith's 'Friends'); in 2001, her version of the song was included on a list of the '365 most significant songs of the twentieth-century prepared by the Recording Industry Association of America (it was 326, right behind Elton John's 'Candle in the Wind')."
 * The song title appeared another two more times as being covered by others, and in three additional articles as a touchstone. So I suspect, it's somewhat under-sourced but notable. Walter Görlitz (talk) 05:08, 24 October 2019 (UTC)