Talk:Jesus/Archive 132

Cleaning up first sentence
First sentences tend to get hyper-cluttered. See this discussion at FAC which stemmed from a big mess the WMF made because mobile readers (over half our readers!) need to scroll to get through the alt-name clutter and end up navigating away instead.

I am proposing that we change the first sentence as follows. This doesn't lose any information, it just clears out the alt-name clutter.

Instead of

"Jesus (c. 4 BC), also referred to as Jesus of Nazareth and Jesus Christ, was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the central figure of Christianity. Most Christians believe him to be the incarnation of God the Son and the awaited Messiah (Christ) prophesied in the Old Testament."

Do this

"Jesus (c. 4 BC) was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the central figure of Christianity. Most Christians believe him to be the incarnation of God the Son and the awaited Messiah (Christ) prophesied in the Old Testament. Jesus is also referred to as Jesus of Nazareth and Jesus Christ."

-- Jytdog (talk) 05:39, 20 April 2018 (UTC)


 * Yes, but you should put Hebrew/Aramaic instead of just Hebrew in your references. Im sure you can double up using those language tags right? Otherwise I think it should just be listed as the original Aramaic. Colliric (talk) 05:46, 20 April 2018 (UTC)
 * That seems reasonable. Let's see what others think. Jytdog (talk) 05:48, 20 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Comment I think you have to mention Christ, and preferably explain what that means before mentioning he was a Jewish preacher. I can look more closely at sources, but I have a lot of sources on this topic. I imagine this will end up at RfC, but I would appreciate some time to go through those sources and come up with something fair before it does. I'm puzzled by one issue in the lede - is baptism a Jewish practice? The lede says Jesus was a Galilean Jew who was baptized by John the Baptist and subsequently began his own ministry, preaching his message orally - I'm not sure that sentence makes sense the way we wrote it... Seraphim System ( talk ) 05:52, 20 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm pretty troubled by this also - the lede says Jesus debated with fellow Jews on how to best follow God, engaged in healings, taught in parables and gathered followers. - but there is no mention of the Samaritans? This is hugely important... Seraphim System ( talk ) 06:02, 20 April 2018 (UTC)
 * It makes this more difficult when lots of issues are piled into a thread. Would you please open separate threads on the baptism and debating things, and please just focus on moving the alt names out of the first sentence in this thread? With regard to waiting, sure, I don't mind. No deadline. Jytdog (talk) 06:08, 20 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Isnt he primary topic for this Jesus Christ - a schismatic figure - Im new to the article - is the consensus on this article that it ia a biography. I think the part about central fgure out Christianity and most Christians believe him to be the Christ has to come first. The part about being a Jewish preacher probably belongs in the second paragraph (where it ia repeated anyway) Seraphim System ( talk ) 06:23, 20 April 2018 (UTC)
 * A biographical article would put the "Jewish preacher" part first.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 06:36, 20 April 2018 (UTC)


 * unclear if folks are agreeing or not, to moving the alt names out of the first sentence... Jytdog (talk) 03:11, 23 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree with Johnbod's comment above. Adding the Aramaic Yeshua may confuse people and bloat the lead. I support moving this article to Jesus Christ since Jesus Christ redirects here and it would avoid this confusion about historical Jesus ... I think the sentence "Jesus Christ was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious leader" is not a good first sentence. Something like Christians believe Jesus is the Jewish messiah prophercized in both the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. (copied from the Christ (title)) article would be better. Seraphim System ( talk ) 04:02, 23 April 2018 (UTC)


 * I'm happy with it as it is now, but am ok with Jytdog's version also. Johnbod (talk) 13:09, 23 April 2018 (UTC)


 * Most of the comments here have been about other things. We really should start articles with simple, declarative sentences, without alt name clutter per  this discussion at FAC. Jytdog (talk) 14:38, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

note on citing aramaic in footnote
So the coding of the footnote uses a template that looks like this in wikitext -- ישוע, which renders like this: ישוע

There is no way to change the "Hebrew" there to "Hebrew/Aramaic" as requested.

There is a separate template for aramaic -- ישוע, which renders like this: ישוע

What do folks think of adding that to the note? Jytdog (talk) 03:11, 23 April 2018 (UTC)
 * If the Aramaic is identical to the Hebrew, I would lean against including it. StAnselm (talk) 18:54, 23 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Or just drop the inflexible template & do it in text. Johnbod (talk) 02:26, 24 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I think the foreign characters have a pretty bad effect on readability when added to the text, but I would support Aramaic in the footnote. Why would we use Hebrew instead of Aramaic? Although Netanyahu insists that "Jesus was here, in this land. He spoke Hebrew,", the strong scholarly consensus is still Aramaic. Seraphim System ( talk ) 04:24, 24 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I actually kind of regret bringing this up now because looking at the sources  I doubt we are going to be able to reach an agreement on whether to use the aramaic or the Hebrew template. Washington Post says There's scholarly consensus that the historical Jesus principally spoke Aramaic and that is WP:RS so we could use it, if it we wanted to, I guess — but they don't cite any sources  — based on the academic sources I am looking at the only consensus seems to be that scholars don't know. Maybe this is why editors decided against adding it in the first place. Seraphim System  ( talk ) 04:41, 24 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Please see the well-sourced discussion of language in the body of the article at Jesus. Jytdog (talk) 14:39, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Baptism
just found a great source on the context of baptism Jytdog (talk) 18:47, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

How is saying "Christian Church" POV?
Please explain why you keep changing the lead to say that Jesus's followers later became the "Church" rather than the "Christian Church." Are you trying to suggest that they might have founded some other church, like the Church of Scientology, the Church of Aphrodite, the Church of Satan, the Church of Euthanasia, or one of the many hundred non-Christian "churches" that are around nowadays? As far as I am concerned, the terms "follower of Jesus" and "Christian" are entirely synonymous; the fact that they followed Jesus is what distinguished the first Jewish Christians from their fellow Jews. --Katolophyromai (talk) 02:18, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I had the same problem with . The term Church is a disambiguation, the only possible link is Christian Church. It is surely not about Justice Church. I will revert it back again. --MaoGo (talk) 11:36, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, the belief that "follower of Jesus" and "Christian" are entirely synonymous is a bit simplistic. What about Jews for Jesus, Christian atheism, or Unitarian Universalism which includes followers of Christian teachings? Islam considers Jesus the penultimate prophet. There are rather a lot  of different religious and philosophical constructs. O3000 (talk) 14:41, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
 * My view is that Jews for Jesus, Christian atheism, and Unitarian Universalism all qualify as variants of Christianity. Jews for Jesus, and modern Messianic Judaism in general, actually has much in common with the original Jewish Christianity, as well as with the Ebionites, who were a sect of early Christians living in the second and third centuries. In fact, the Ebionites actually had far more in common with traditional Judaism than Jews for Jesus does today. (The Ebionites, for instance, rejected the apostle Paul as an apostate and believed that Jesus was just a man, not God incarnate. They also insisted on strict adherence to the Law of Moses, including circumcision and Jewish dietary customs, which they made even stricter by not only prohibiting non-kosher meats, but by flat-out forbidding all meats altogether. They used a version of the Gospel of Matthew that did not include the story of the virgin birth, which they rejected as a heretical interpolation.) Unitarian Universalism actually originated as a denomination of Christianity, although they have since expanded to include beliefs from other religious traditions.
 * It may sound like I am taking too broad a definition of the word "Christian," but the fact is that all the groups you have mentioned, even Christian atheism, have far more in common with traditional, orthodox Christianity than say, the Borborites did in the late third century and early fourth century; yet no one has any qualms about calling the Borborites or any of the other bizarre Gnostic sects "Christian." That is not even considering the many people in late antiquity who worshipped the Christian God alongside traditional pagan ones and yet still saw themselves as "Christian." Really, the only consistent definition of the word "Christianity" that we can take is "any religion or philosophy that is at least purportedly founded on the teachings of Jesus" and, by that definition, the terms "Christian" and "follower of Jesus" can only be synonymous. --Katolophyromai (talk) 16:17, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I just don't see the two as synonymous. Neither does the OED. O3000 (talk) 16:25, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I do not have a copy of the Oxford English Dictionary and it is not available for free online, so I do not know what its definition of the word "Christian" is, but Merriam-Webster defines the word "Christian" as "one who professes belief in the teachings of Jesus Christ," which is almost exactly what I just defined it as. --Katolophyromai (talk) 16:47, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
 * The OED includes: “One who exhibits the spirit, and follows the precepts and example, of Christ”. Usage example: “To be a Christian is to act as Christ acted.” Perhaps subtle. But, I think you can call yourself a Christian because you like the non-religious teachings without considering yourself a follower. IIRC, the Texas Legislature ruled that Unitarians are not Christians. I’d rather we not put strict limits on the definition, just as I think you can be an existentialist without being a follower of Kierkegaard. O3000 (talk) 17:09, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I think we may be operating under different definitions of the word "follow." The way I see it, "liking the non-religious teachings" to the point that a person would be willing to define him or herself by those teachings would be following them. In any case, I think this discussion has gotten way off-topic and this is starting to seem too much like a forum. My original concern about the article no longer seems to be the subject of debate and, the user I originally addressed this section to, has not yet responded to my request for explanation. --Katolophyromai (talk) 18:32, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
 * That's the problem I have with the word synonym.:) O3000 (talk) 18:35, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Obviously, "Christian Church" is a buzzword used by Protestants, and that is what the article "Christian Church" is even about. And therefore, should not be used. Church, is of course from its history, primarily CChristain in usage, and even the non-Christian groups that use 'church" have some claim on Jesus.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 01:29, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Even if it is the case, when one says vaguely says Jesus followers formed the church it cannot be another than the Christian church in a broad sense. If we want to avoid this ambiguity change church for christian tradition or other hub term that is more general or specify more/eliminate the whole line entirely. In Wikipedia we are trying to avoid links to disambiguation page when not necessary. --MaoGo (talk) 11:14, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I do not see why you seem to think that the term "Christian Church" is a "buzzword," and I certainly do not see why you consider it to be POV. It is a general term used to refer to the entire community of Christians. Nonetheless, to appease you, would you like to suggest an alternative term to use instead? We cannot just use the word "church" because that would be too ambiguous, since we would have to specify which church we are talking about. (The word church itself is a translation of the Greek word ekklesia, which just means "assembly" or "gathering". The exact same word was also used to refer to the Athenian Assembly.) Perhaps we could just use the definition of the word "Christian Church," which is "the community of Christian believers"? --Katolophyromai (talk) 11:56, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
 * It says on your user page that you are a Protestant Christian and that you are possibly biased. I'm not attempting to attacking you, but I think this is one of those cases.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 06:10, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Please explain why you think the use of the word is biased; just saying that I am biased too is not providing an explanation. You keep insisting that the phrase is biased without explaining why. Also, please tell what you think of my alternative proposal, or offer a different proposal yourself. I am trying to sort out this issue and find a wording we all can agree on. What do you think of replacing the term "Christian Church" with "earliest body of Christians" or perhaps "earliest community of Christians" or something similar? --Katolophyromai (talk) 09:25, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Add me to the list of people thinking that "Church" is silly absent a really cogent explanation about why it is "POV". A discussion is to gauge consensus, not to gain unanimity. It doesn't matter if one or two editors think it is inappropriate if consensus says otherwise. Disruption such as long-term edit warring can be dealt with if one editor insists on repeatedly reverting multiple editors. Someone not liking consensus needs to use WP:DR: it's not up to others. Johnuniq (talk) 10:12, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * The terms have different meanings to different people. I see no reason for the second half of the sentence. O3000 (talk) 14:16, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I just did some poking around and ended up seeing this debate here, but I think that the crux of the argument is, as ScepticismOfPopularisation pointed out, that Protestants use the word "Christian" to distinguish themselves from Catholics, even though, in fact, the Church that was set up in that century was the Catholic Church. Moreover, the linked term "Christian Church" links to a page that says "The Christian Church is an ecclesiological term generally used by Protestants to refer to the whole group of people belonging to the Christianity throughout history." However, since Protestantism did not exist at this time and would not exist for another 1500 years or so, it is most certainly POV to, at the very least, link to a page that somehow links Protestantism with the original Church. (I think this is what is being seen as POV here—there is an obvious attempt to deceptively claim that the "Christian Church" started during Roman times was, in some way, the true Church that has now manifested itself in the form of Protestantism.) Ambrosiaster (talk) 19:29, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * And just to add: One possible solution could be to just fix the article on the Christian Church by removing the phrase "generally used by Protestants." If the argument here by Katolophyromai and others is that the "Christian Church" is not a term generally used by Protestants, then why does the article entitled Christian Church say that? Ambrosiaster (talk) 19:46, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I do not think that is what the article is claiming at all. The term "Christian Church" does not just apply to Protestants; it includes all Christians, and that includes Catholics and Eastern Orthodox Christians, who are definitely Christians without a doubt.
 * On a side note, the original church that existed in antiquity was neither Catholic, nor Protestant, nor Eastern Orthodox, nor anything that we today would recognize as any modern denomination. Both Protestantism and the Catholic Church as we know it today are products of the past two thousand years. For instance, both Protestants and Catholics today use unleavened bread for the Eucharist, but, prior to the ninth century, Christians actually used leavened bread. The earliest Christians practiced adult baptism by immersion (like some modern Protestants), but none of them would have believed in Protestant ideas of sola fide or sola scriptura, especially since there was widespread disagreement on what even constituted as "scripture" to begin with. The idea of a set New Testament canon is not attested until the middle of the second century and, until as late as the late third century, most communities still had their own individual sets of scriptures. Many early Christians of the Proto-Orthodox sect considered writings such as The Shepherd of Hermas, the Didache, and the Epistles of Clement to be canonical, while others rejected the canonicity of works such as the Book of Revelation and the Catholic epistles that are now included in the New Testament. The concept of the Trinity, central to nearly all modern forms of Christianity, did not develop until the late second or early third century at the earliest and was not declared orthodox until many centuries later. Furthermore, the vast diversity within early Christianity makes it absurd to see the term "Christian Church" as only referring to one particular sect. Despite what one might assume based on a reading of the fourth-century church historian Eusebius's propagandistic Ecclesiastical History, Christianity was diverse from its very inception, and the epistles of the apostle Paul reveal just how much disagreement and contention there was, even among the earliest apostles. --Katolophyromai (talk) 20:11, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * You're making a theological argument. Of course, when the Roman Catholic Church was in its infancy, it had different rituals and the canon was not well-established. For example, priests were allowed to marry in the early church. But does that mean that it isn't Catholic? No. It was just the Catholic Church with different rituals and a different canon, but it is the same institution. As time went on, the Church naturally faced new controversies and changed considerably over time. Arguing that that Church was not Catholic because it had different rituals and the canon was not concrete is like arguing that the United States of today is not same United States as 1776 because the United States today has judicial review and is heavily influenced by a number of Supreme Court cases and amendments that systemically changed the country... Addressing the matter at hand, however, I do agree with ScepticismOfPopularisation that, based on the definition provided by the article Christian Church, and, to a degree, based on how Protestants use the term "Christian" to distinguish themselves from Catholics and Orthodox Christians (as a way to say, "we are the true Christians") is, in a sense, why this is a matter of debate here and some are saying it is a POV issue. That's what he meant by "buzzword." I agree that, speaking in terms of the word's denotation, this may not be the case, but the word "Christian Church" connotes something particular about the Protestant-Catholic relationship (and it is even more pronounced when the link to "Christian Church" claims that the term "Christian Church" is used primarily by Protestants, and not by Catholics or other "Christians"). - Ambrosiaster (talk) 20:57, 27 April 2018 (UTC)


 * Obviously, there exist disagreements on these terms. The simple solution is to remove that part of the sentence. Particularly since this article is about Jesus, not Christianity. Theological arguments don’t belong in this article. O3000 (talk) 21:05, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, I'd agree. I just read it back to myself again and it certainly is POV. The sentence sort of suggests that his followers formed the "Christian Church" (but since this is a mainly Protestant term, it is implying that this is the "Protestant movement"). There is clearly something wrong with this sentence and removing it might be the best option here, then. Ambrosiaster (talk) 21:14, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * And just to add, as I read it again, I am asking myself, "What is the Christian Church"? I know that there is, as a matter of fact, a Roman Catholic Church, an Eastern Orthodox Church, and a Presbyterian Church, for example, but the "Christian Church" is some sort of broad theological term that Protestants use. There is no "Christian Church," really. There are "Christian churches," but can you tell me what the "Christian Church" is? Ambrosiaster (talk) 21:19, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Simply put, and not as sarcastic as it sounds, it's a brand name. O3000 (talk) 21:23, 27 April 2018 (UTC)
 * USer:Jytdog. Clearly, the "opinion" that "Christian Church" is a mainly Protestant term is founded upon reliable sources. Particularly those over at Christian Church.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 05:31, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I think early Church may be the most precise link for the disputed line, and would largely resolve what is an otherwise impossible predicament of which Church to link to. Seraphim System  ( talk ) 08:02, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * The matter of this discussion is to either leave CC or to find an alternative. Early church is a good solution. --MaoGo (talk) 09:57, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I have changed the sentence to say "early Church" rather than "Christian Church." --Katolophyromai (talk) 16:15, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Better. O3000 (talk) 16:19, 28 April 2018 (UTC)


 * Several things:
 * Church is an unacceptable option. That is a disambig page, and there is no way in hell that we will link to a disambig page on a featured article.
 * Everybody here needs to read WP:LEAD. The lead just summarizes the body of the article.  The right question to ask is "What does the sourced content in the body of the article already say about this, and how do we summarize that?"
 * No one cares what any one of you think the correct words are here - you are all just presenting "reasoning" based on what you happen to think is more or less correct, without citing any sources or any WP policies and guidelines. What matters are what sources say and how to summarize them per the policies and guidelines - again the conversation should be focused on what the sourced content in the body of the article already says.  If any one is not happy with that content or its sources, the thing to do is fix that first.  Then work on summarizing it in the lead.
 * The discussion above is not how we do things in Wikipedia, on any level. You are just having a coffee klatch, completely outside the policies and guidelines of this place. You might be enjoying it -- if so please go do it somewhere else.  It is not what we do here.
 * If you want to continue to work on improving the WP:LEAD, please base that discussion on the policies and guidelines. Jytdog (talk) 14:11, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I checked the source behind that statement, which is E. P. Sanders's 1993 book The Historical Figure of Jesus, which I ironically happened to be already holding in my hands before I even saw the footnote. On page 11, the first page that is cited, he states that one of the few facts about the aftermath of Jesus's life that is so widely agreed upon among scholars that it is "almost beyond dispute" is that "[his followers] formed a community to await his return and sought to win others to the faith in him as God's Messiah." In this sentence, he does not use the term "Christian Church." On page 14, which is the second page that is cited, he states that, later, "Their movement finally separated from Judaism and became the Christian church." So, Sanders does use the term "Christian church," but only on the second page that is cited to support the statement we are debating. I think that our solution discussed above of using the term "early Church" rather than "Christian Church" adequately solves the issue of neutrality and still remains faithful to the source being cited. --Katolophyromai (talk) 16:39, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * That is a better argument, but again per LEAD we should be summarizing the body of the article, and not introducing any new matter. So the relevant question is, where is this discussed in the body?  It is a real question. Please actually look.  (It is not! in my view there should be some WP:SUMMARY content taken from the lead of Early Christianity and perhaps also Hellenistic Judaism  and added to the body.  That content should focus at least some on the historiography issues -- how the people at that time shaped the narrative about him and wrote the fundamental texts that everybody wrestles over today.  The term Septuagint doesn't even appear in this article, but the writers of the NT wrote in greek and were often quoting the LXX - like when they wrote that strange passage in matthew about jesus approaching jerusalem riding an ass and a colt, where they are quoting zechariah in the LXX.  In any case, Sanders should be used there, and the use in the lead just a repetition of that, in case anybody questions the summary content (it is not needed if the lead is just summarizing the body, again per LEAD))
 * Some of this is touched on in the Jesus section, but i think it would be better if there were some section after his life, where it talks about what happened shortly (in historical terms) after his life. Jytdog (talk) 17:00, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't think there is a specific known date for the birth of the Church, but I can look through some additional sources since I was planning to work on the Early Christianity article anyway. This wouldn't have to be a separate section — it would just expand the section we already have Jesus — the section does discuss the Septuagint but not by name. If that section were clarified I think it would be enough. Seraphim System  ( talk ) 20:22, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Certainly makes sense in Early Christianity. I don't see why it would work here as this article is about Jesus, and he didn't really form a "church". O3000 (talk) 20:26, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * replying to both... there just should just be something in the body that this is summarizing - where the Sanders source is used in a larger discussion.  There isn't now.  There are many ways to solve it. Jytdog (talk) 21:49, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Some of the claims could have been sourced using outside sources, but I think that those engaging in the discussion felt that the Christian Church article was sufficient enough grounds for arguing that Christian Church is merely an "ecclesiological term" and not an actual Church (that either exists at present or in a historical sense) and that it was therefore the incorrect term to use in this sentence. Since the word is also, according to the Christian Church article that was used as a reference point, used mainly by Protestants and therefore connotes something about Protestantism (it is a grey area, in other words), it also violated WP:NPOV. Although no one directly linked us to WP:NPOV, one of the users did invoke the policy in the discussion.


 * In the end, a resolution was reached and the incorrect term, Christian Church, was changed to a more appropriate term, early Church. (You are right that what is most important here is that the summary should reflect the content of the article and that that should be the first priority.) Personally, I thought your closing the debate in a draconian manner and dismissing it as "coffee house klatch" was a bit over-the-top. In the end, a resolution was reached, so I'm not sure if your closure and classification of the discussion (which I admit, could've contained more outside sources to make it airtight) was really fair. - Ambrosiaster (talk) 01:53, 1 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The conversation was completely wrong and the resulting edit was wrong. It should not be in the lead, as it doesn't summarize anything in the body of the article. This kind of editing threatens the FA status of this article. Jytdog (talk) 02:05, 1 May 2018 (UTC)
 * If it doesn't belong there, then why is still there? And why not immediately propose deleting the sentence altogether from the outset? When you closed it, you did so on the grounds that it was "coffee house klatch" without sources, and not on the grounds that the discussion was altogether irrelevant because the sentence does not belong in the lead. Had you said that the sentence itself needed to be deleted because it does not summarize the content of the article and that the discussion is therefore meaningless, then the discussion would've ended there. But it did not because you ended it on an unclear basis. - Ambrosiaster (talk) 02:38, 1 May 2018 (UTC)


 * the thing is to get things done and done right, so i fixed it, here. That can probably be improved, but now the lead summarizes the body. this was ass-backwards but now things make sense per policies and guidelines. Jytdog (talk) 04:55, 1 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Ok. I can now see it following a logical line. Starts with the birth, ends with the death and ascension, and then proceeds to the posthumous stuff (i.e. early Christianity). Seems the "coffee house klatch" led to some positive improvements for the article after all. Ambrosiaster (talk) 05:16, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Jewish vs. Rabbinic
How exactly is "Jewish" better than Rabbinic as a header?ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 04:50, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
 * it's clearly more recognizable and is a broader term definition.--Moxy (talk) 05:04, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 May 2018
ܝܼܫܘܿܥܐ ܢܵܨܪܵܝܵܐ; Alexappachan (talk) 18:17, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. L293D (☎ • ✎) 18:19, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Deity
Has there ever been a talk about linking Deity in the lead or anywhere. I see many source here use the term. Good link for people to understand that Jesus is one of many god like individual's that people follow. Plus it has a section about Christian God definition.-Moxy (talk) 05:08, 2 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Deity is used in a slightly different sense (here), so no.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 02:18, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I am not entirely sure what you are proposing, but I am strongly opposed to adding another sentence or phrase just for the sake of linking to some article or another. Content has to be purposeful and informative on its own, and, especially for this article in particular, we need to make sure to include the most relevant and important information first and foremost. Linking to related articles comes secondary. If the word "deity" happened to occur naturally in the article, I would have no problem whatsoever with linking to the article on the subject, an article (which, I might note, I actually have written a significant portion of). I am similarly not opposed to adding it as a "see also" link at the beginning of a section or at the end of the article. --Katolophyromai (talk) 02:44, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Could be added without any great change or addition. Just change the leads odd descriptor of "figure"  to a relevant descriptor with a link to more information on this vety topic. ="He is the central figure deity of Christianity:--Moxy (talk) 04:46, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Obviously, some denominations (read:many) don't believe Jesus to be God.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 04:49, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
 * That is a wonderful POV but how does ommiting a link to an article with sources about this very topic help our readers? As stated before it's clearly a term used all over within the community itself......--Moxy (talk) 04:58, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Accuracy is far more important than linking. We cannot introduce Jesus as the "central deity of Christianity" because, as has rightly pointed out, there are plenty of Christian sects, both historical and contemporary, who believe that Jesus was not God. (Indeed, it is historically likely that Jesus himself never claimed to be divine, since he never does in any of the Synoptic Gospels, our earliest source about his life, and his own Jewish followers would have almost certainly been appalled by the idea of someone calling him divine.) Even those who agree he was divine do not all agree on what sense he was divine in. There are tons of different perspectives on Jesus's divinity: Docetism, Adoptionism, Arianism, Modalistic Monarchianism, Trinitarianism, Monophysitism, and countlesss others, all of which are drastically different from each other. Introducing him as the "central deity of Christianity" simply is not accurate for all forms of Christianity. Also, in terms of linking, there are other articles that are far more directly relevant to this one than deity, such as all our various sub-articles about Jesus. It would not be justifiable to change the definition of "Jesus" in the first sentence of the article just to squeeze in a link to a semi-relevant article. --Katolophyromai (talk) 08:29, 3 May 2018 (UTC)
 * As an outsider to religions. ...I think I see where your coming from. You keep talking in a singularity...as if to imply there is only one deity in the religion and not all agree about his sayus. As an outsider it looks like Christian Saints and their religious miracles are alot like the many Roman/gresk/ Persian etc... gods and goddesses holding a special place within the doctrine. Are Saints not worshipped as well? I was implying they were many deities with Christian God/Jesus as  the head deity. --Moxy (talk) 05:09, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
 * This is getting off-topic and is starting to turn into more of a forum discussion, but I will answer your question nonetheless because it is still tangentially related to the article. Saints are not "worshipped" in any denomination of Christianity, but they are venerated in some traditions, namely Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions. Those Christians who do believe in the veneration of saints do not see them as deities, but rather as a very holy human beings whose righteous actions while they were alive have given them a certain level of prominence in Heaven, so that one can ask them to pray on a person's behalf. The assumption, of course, is that a saint's prayers will carry more weight with God than just those of the average person. The short answer to your question, therefore, is that saints are not in any way seen as deities.
 * Nonetheless, the comparison between saints and polytheistic deities is, on some levels, valid because, in the traditions where they are venerated, saints do generally have cults and shrines, much like polytheistic deities. Also, the cults of many saints have adopted many stories and features from pre-Christian pagan deities. To give just one famous example, the Irish saint Brigid of Kildare is probably just a Christianization of the pre-Christian Celtic goddess Brigid. Not all saints are Christianized deities, though, and many of them were, in fact, real people who lived and died. It is also very important to stress that the veneration of saints is not accepted in all denominations of Christianity. In fact, most Protestants reject the veneration of saints as heretical, seeing it as essentially polytheism, and a significant number of Protestants completely reject the concept of a "saint" altogether, instead believing that the word "saint" can be applied to any believer. --Katolophyromai (talk) 15:40, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Birthdate
According to current historical records Herod died in 4 bc. The slaughter of the innocents took place 2 years before. Therefore the accepted date of Jesus birth is around 6 bc not 4 bc. Tbhighland (talk) 07:46, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

The Massacre of the Innocents is a dubious event, recorded only in the Gospel of Matthew. "The massacre is reported only in the Gospel of Matthew (2:16) and other later Christian writings likely based on that gospel. The Roman Jewish historian Josephus does not mention it in his history, Antiquities of the Jews (c. 94 AD), which reports many of Herod's misdeeds, including murdering three of his own sons, Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews,, his mother-in-law (Antiquities 15:247–251; LCL 8:117–119), and his second wife (Antiquities 15:222–236; LCL 8:107–113)." Its historicity is questionable, and the two contradictory accounts of the Nativity of Jesus have one key difference: No involvement of Herod the Great in the account of the Gospel of Luke.

As usual, you can't trust what the Gospels are saying. The historical Jesus was likely neither born in Bethlehem, nor was even connected to the town. "According to Brown, there is no uniform agreement among scholars on the historicity of the accounts, e.g., most of those scholars who reject the historicity of the birth at Bethlehem argue for a birth at Nazareth, a few suggest Capernaum, and other have hypothesized locations as far away as Chorazin." Dimadick (talk) 09:15, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Virtually all?
"Virtually all modern scholars of antiquity agree that Jesus existed historically." Dubious, overly broad assertion. Historical Jesus Christ is very much in doubt.AaronCBurke (talk) 18:38, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Whether or not he existed, the evidence that historians think he existed is compelling. Do you have evidence otherwise? See the FAQ Q3 at the top of this page. O3000 (talk) 18:52, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

This mutual admiration society is beneath my notice.AaronCBurke (talk) 21:05, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
 * "Mutual admiration society"--nonsense from a troll. Closing thread.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 08:39, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

Knowing and thinking
Edit: Christians did not believe Jesus is Christ they knew and we still do Meldoythemush (talk) 20:50, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * See WP:NOTFORUM and WP:No original research. Ian.thomson (talk) 21:20, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 24 May 2018
Please change: After crucifixion

The Resurrection of Christ from a 16th-century copy of La Passion de Nostre Seigneur After Jesus' death, his followers said he rose from the dead, although exact details of their experiences are unclear. Some of those who claimed to have witnessed Jesus' resurrection later died for their belief, which indicates that their beliefs were likely genuine

to remove: , which indicates that their beliefs were likely genuine

because this is a dubious assertion without and causative evidence to support it Rasputinmd (talk) 22:16, 24 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. -  FlightTime  ( open channel ) 22:18, 24 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually, I did it while you were responding. I don't see how the sentence makes any sense. How does the fact that some followers died suggest he was resurected? In any case, it's just an opinion, and this article isn't about CHristianity. O3000 (talk) 22:25, 24 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Thank you. -  FlightTime  ( open channel ) 22:26, 24 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I attempted to write a replacement that, I believe, captures the original intent of this statement while making it objective. I don't feel particularly strongly about this though, so feel free to revert if you still don't like it. Jtrevor99 (talk) 22:35, 24 May 2018 (UTC)


 * We summarize sources here. Sanders is cited there, and Sanders doesn't discuss martyrdom as being related to the sincerity or genuine-ness of their beliefs, that i could find. There is no page number cited.  That whole bit appears to be somebody's editorializing.Jytdog (talk) 23:28, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

Disciples' faith and the resurrection
[] this contains the exact wording of Sanders, who said this statement as a credentialed scholar. The content does not exclude plausibilites of hallucination or delusion, so no problem.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 09:33, 27 May 218 (UTC)
 * Noting - without that bit, the paragraph reads perfectly: After Jesus' death, his followers said he rose from the dead, although exact details of their experiences are unclear. According to Sanders, the Gospel reports contradict each other, which, according to him, suggests competition among those claiming to have seen him first rather than deliberate fraud.(sfn|Sanders|1993|pp=276–81), That bit was obviously plopped in after the first sentence in some sort of effort at apologia. Which we don't do here.  I am betting that is what happened.  Will go diff hunting. Jytdog (talk) 09:10, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * yep, see this version (which had a ref after the 1st sentence) from Nov 2015. The content that got stuck in the middle was first added to the page in this diff in Dec 2015 in a diffrerent place, and a few diffs later was moved to follow the first sentence, but in front of the ref. Horrible editing. Jytdog (talk) 09:40, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * As we can see from the first diff Jytdog provided, it was first added by Jonathan Tweet, an obvious atheist-meaning for the first time it was added, it was not out of a desire for apologetics(perhaps the sloppy moving is, but that is besides the point). This gives weight to my argument.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 09:47, 27 May 2018 (UTC)


 * So I have Sanders. It is the version linked in the citation, which google books says published in 1995 and has isbn 9780141928227 (which is the same isbn cited).  Interestingly the citation itself, has the date 1993. Which is just odd and doesn't match the link or the isbn.  Anyway, in the version I have, pp 279-80 is a discussion of Jesus and the wicked (at the end of the chapter "Contention and Opposition in Galilee" - -jesus hanging out with the wicked was part of his contentiousness.)   I searched my book for the phrase from the book linked above, and that phrase does appear on p 333, in a chapter unsurprisingly called "Epilogue: The Resurrection"  Maybe the 1993 edition was organized differently; maybe Sean McDowell got the page wrong. Who knows.  But I am not a "liar" as claimed here; you cannot go back and strike edit notes, unfortunately.
 * So OK, this is sourced. It still does not belong where it is - I showed above that it was plopped, sloppily, into the middle of the flow of the thought of the first two sentences. Phrasing it more as McDowell does, would make it less apologia-esque as well. I am open to suggestions for phrasing and location. To which I will respond tomorrow, after I wake up. Jytdog (talk) 10:00, 27 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Licona is WP:FRINGE: historians cannot prove miracles, period.


 * Citing Tgeorgescu (talk) 21:04, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

"Nor do we have reliable accounts from later times. What we have are legends, about some of the apostles – chiefly Peter, Paul, Thomas, Andrew, and John.  But the apocryphal Acts that tell their stories are indeed highly apocryphal."

- Bart D. Ehrman


 * Quoted by Tgeorgescu (talk) 10:01, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Licona is not "fringe". He is in fact, a [| friend of and respected as a historian by Bart Ehrman, whom you cited here as a reliable source.]It is just that proving miracles lie outside the field of history-this does not make a historian who argues for them to their specific demographic "fringe". You don't seem to understand how academic agnosticism works;I will grearly appreciate it if you stop the misinformation, period. Also, you doln't seem to get what I am saying: This is not exclusively and necessarily an argument for the resurrection as it first added here by  a knowledgeable-on-the-topic atheist, and does not exclude possibilities for hallucination or delusion. How we even got to discussing "proving miracles" is ridiculous.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 10:11, 27 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Licona says he can prove the resurrection, historically. Tgeorgescu (talk) 10:14, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Using the historical method is not the same as posting your beliefs as objective history. ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk)11:35, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Neither version adequately portrays the century-old theological controversy surrounding the credibility of the Gospel ressurection narrative, which is ridden with discrepancies. See That the apostles upheld their convictions in spite of suffering and death is only a minor argument of several that have been brought forward to support the credibility of their narrative. --62.99.192.174 (talk) 10:33, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Which supported their narrative no more than that Jim Jones's followers upheld their convictions and drank the poison Kool-Aid. Would they have died for a lie? Yes, yes they did. ~ Röbin Liönheart (talk) 12:07, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Unreliable source, and as I said before, not what is being talked about. ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 11:35, 27 May 2018 (UTC)


 * So, we’re saying that assuming the gospels (known for contradiction, passed down, and translated) accurately portrayed events from 2,000 years ago, and assuming devote followers of a nascent philosophy were in a rational state of mind, and that a belief  in resurrection may have resulted in their deaths, then this suggests that they would have honestly believed they saw the resurrection. And, that  they believed this so strongly further suggests it actually occurred. Seems mighty thin for inclusion in a bio. Maybe in an article on theological arguments of Christianity. O3000 (talk) 12:43, 27 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Suppose an Ancient document would be discovered stating that Antiochus Epiphanes was raised from the dead and appeared to several thousand people. Would that constitute historical evidence of Antiochus's resurrection? Obviously not, so the case of Jesus is just special pleading and WP:FRINGE/PS (pseudohistory). Tgeorgescu (talk) 13:06, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Tgeorgescu, religious pseudohistory, even according to the article you linked to, is The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, and not attempting to prove a miracle to a Christian audience (the Christian audience means that he is not passing it as historical truth). Funny how you are somehow better at judging a fringe historian than Bart Ehrman is.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 09:19, 28 May 2018 (UTC)

I am surprised that everyone here is talking about whether or not Jesus was actually resurrected because that is not what the statement that was removed from the article was saying. As far as I can tell from reading it, it was only saying that his followers genuinely believed he was resurrected, which is not an apologetic claim and is something that most scholars of early Christianity agree on. Sanders, as has already been mentioned, devotes a whole chapter of his book The Historical Figure of Jesus to a historical analysis of the resurrection. In the original book, which was genuinely published in 1993 (meaning is definitely working with a later reprint of it which may not have the same pages numbers), this discussion is found on pages 276 through 281. In the course of this discussion, Sanders writes, "I do not regard deliberate fraud as a worthwhile explanation. Many of these people in these lists were to spend the rest of their lives proclaiming that they had seen the risen Lord, and several of them would die for their cause. Moreover, a calculated deception should have produced greater unanimity. Instead, there seem to have been competitors: 'I saw him first!' 'No! I did!' Paul's tradition that 500 people saw Jesus at the same time has led some people to suggest that Jesus's followers suffered mass hysteria, but mass hysteria does not explain the other traditions." Sanders ultimately concludes, "That Jesus's followers (and later Paul) had resurrection experiences is, in my judgement, a fact. What the reality was behind those experiences I do not know." In other words, he says that the disciples definitely thought he was resurrected, but that he does not know whether those beliefs were correct. [What Sanders means when he says "resurrection experiences" is "experiences in which they thought they saw the risen Jesus," not "experiences in which they definitely really saw him."]

I shall further elucidate Sanders's reasoning here because there seems to be confusion over it: He is not saying that the fact that some of those who thought they saw the risen Jesus later died for that belief in any way proves that the belief was true, but rather he is only saying that it indicates that the belief was sincere. In other words, that they genuinely thought it was true. Now, cites Candida Moss, who argues that "we simply don't know how any of the apostles died, much less whether they were martyred." For the most part, Moss is correct, but we do, in fact, know for certain that Jesus's brother James (who was not officially one of the twelve apostles) was stoned to death under the orders of the High Priest Ananus, since this event is described by Josephus in Antiquities of the Jews Book XX, Chapter 9, Paragraph 1. Josephus was probably in the city of Jerusalem at the time and may have even witnessed the event himself; furthermore, he mentions it off-the-cuff in the context of Ananus's removal from the office of High Priest, so there is every reason to believe his account is disinterested and accurate. We also have a strong early tradition, referenced as early as John 21:18-19, supporting the possibility that Peter may have also been martyred in some form or another. There probably is not enough evidence to support the idea that Peter was really crucified on an upside-down cross in Rome under the Emperor Nero, but it is not unreasonable that he may have been executed. (See pages 84-86 of Ehrman's 2006 book Peter, Paul, and Mary Magdalene: The Early Followers of Jesus in History and Legend for discussion of this tradition.) Paul lists both James and Peter as witnesses to the resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15:3-7, which means we have at least one, probably two, disciples who are known to have claimed to have seen the risen Jesus and later died for that belief. Then, we also have Paul himself, who describes his vision of Jesus in Galatians 1:11-24 and references his imprisonment in his own Letter to Philemon. We do not really know if Paul was executed as the pseudepigraphical Second Letter to Timothy tells us, but the fact that he was willing to suffer imprisonment clearly shows that his beliefs were sincere. Once again, this does not mean that those beliefs were necessarily correct, only that he really held them.

Bart D. Ehrman, whom has already quoted, devotes two whole chapters of his 2014 book How Jesus Became God to a discussion of what we can and cannot know about the resurrection historically, spanning from page 129 to page 210. The discussion is very lengthy and in-depth, so I cannot quote any small part of it here and still do it justice, but Ehrman marshals a great deal of evidence and research, including psychological work dealing with "bereavement visions," in which people sense that a person they knew very well that has recently died is still with them and modern people who have claimed to have seen Jesus or the Virgin Mary. He ultimately concludes that the disciples really thought Jesus had risen from the dead, but that this belief was based on misunderstanding, hallucination, or some kind of visionary experiences, probably induced by their shared sense of grief. He also says that we cannot really know for certain what caused those experiences, only that people experienced them. In other words, he comes to mostly the same conclusion as Sanders.

Maurice Casey, another major biblical scholar, who, like Ehrman, is not a Christian, writes on page 487 of his 2010 book Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historian's Account of His Life and Teaching that "...the accounts of the Resurrection appearances in the Four Gospels contain very little information that is literally true. There is some literal truth behind the accounts of Mark and Matthew. Jesus's male followers, having fled from the Garden of Gethsemane, kept out of the way and soon returned to Galilee. There some of them had experiences which they interpreted as appearances of the risen Jesus." Thus, like the others, Casey concludes that at least some of Jesus's followers genuinely thought he was resurrected, although he goes on to state that at least a few of them apparently refused to believe this, because Matthew 28:7 states that "some doubted": "This must be true, for neither Matthew nor the tradition before him would have made it up. It was desperately unforgettable, because some of the inner group of the Twelve did not believe in Jesus's Resurrection, and they had nothing to do with the formation of the early churches or the spread of the Gospel to the Gentiles." Ehrman, it should be noted, also mentions this fact in his discussion and also accepts it as historically true. Both of them, however, agree that at least some of the disciples genuinely believed that their leader had been raised from the dead.

My conclusion, therefore, in light of what appears to be an overwhelming consensus that at least some of the disciples really thought that Jesus was raised from the dead, is that the removed statement should be restored to the article, but reworded to avoid making it seem as though it is actually claiming that Jesus was raised from the dead, which, of course, is something that we cannot know historically. It seems the crucial point of confusion here is the word "genuine," which I think the original person who wrote this statement probably intended to mean "sincere" or "genuinely felt," but which people in this discussion are wrongly interpreting to mean "vindicated" or "factually accurate." I apologize for the overwhelming length of what I have written here, but I felt all this was necessary to explain and clarify my point and I did not realize how long this would be until I was finished. --Katolophyromai (talk) 16:52, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

arbitrary break
A bunch of the discussion above, is general discussion of the topic, which is not ok per WP:NOTFORUM, not to mention unproductive, and I have closed it. Would people who would like some content about this please: Please keep discussion focused on specific content, sourcing for it, and where it goes. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 17:03, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * a) propose specific content, with specific sourcing
 * b) state precisely where they would like it to be placed?
 * I think Katolophyromai may have a good argument for including this in an article on Christianity. But, not convinced his bio should contain angels on a pin arguments. Which is to say it belongs elsewhere, not in this article. O3000 (talk) 17:10, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * No change. I'll go with not restoring . The article is fine now. Controversial views are unneeded. Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:22, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Considering that the resurrection is discussed in virtually every biography of Jesus ever written and Ehrman says that belief in Jesus's resurrection was one of the main factors that distinguished Jesus from the many other apocalyptic Jewish preachers who lived during the same time period, the sincerity of the disciples' belief in his resurrection is clearly an inherent issue of Jesus's life. It is not an "angels on a pin" argument at all, but one that is necessary for us to address. I would not consider the fact that Jesus's followers sincerely thought he was resurrected to be a "controversial view" at all; all the scholarly sources I have found agree that they did and I have yet to find any scholarly sources arguing that they did not sincerely think he was resurrected. Furthermore, even if you regard this as controversial, it is still an inherent issue that needs to be addressed. --Katolophyromai (talk) 17:42, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't think that it would be controversial that they believed that. I think that right now the article does enough to acknowledge such view. So there is no need for "they died for their faith", which is controversial. Tgeorgescu (talk) 18:08, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Non-trinitarian Christian religions, and the one-quarter of the world population that is Islamic believe he was a prophet, but not divine. To me, an article on Christianity is better location for controversial aspects of divinity. O3000 (talk) 18:11, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The resurrection has very little to do with Jesus's divinity and, on its own, it certainly does not in any way imply that Jesus was necessarily divine. As Ehrman and plenty of other scholars clearly state, the earliest Christians probably did not believe that Jesus was divine, a fact which is supported by how, in all the writings of Paul and in the three Synoptic Gospels, our earliest and most reliable accounts of Jesus's life, there is no point where Jesus is ever claimed to be God incarnate - not even once. Such claims are only found in the later Gospel of John and Epistle to the Hebrews. Paul and the Synoptics, however, all clearly refer to Jesus's resurrection on numerous occasions, and Paul even names it as the most fundamental belief of the Christian faith. Belief in the resurrection came long before belief in Jesus's divinity. --Katolophyromai (talk) 18:22, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I mean After Jesus' death, his followers said he rose from the dead, although exact details of their experiences are unclear. is enough, there no need for a controversial argument being added to it. Tgeorgescu (talk) 18:17, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Sounds good to me. O3000 (talk) 18:20, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

proposal 1
The fact that some early Christians died for their beliefs about Jesus' actions, death, and resurrection, has been used in popular apologia for Christianity and by some scholars to justify either that their beliefs were sincere or that these events actually happened; these are two distinct claims. Some martyrdom narratives are less reliable than others.
 * (source == )

--Jytdog (talk) 17:19, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * This could go as a second sentence in the lead of Jesus, right after "Scholars have reached a limited consensus on the basics of Jesus' life."

Discussion of proposal 1
Sorry about the mess of diffs. Something was breaking the formatting. In any case, please discuss here Jytdog (talk) 17:25, 27 May 2018 (UTC)


 * I agree with the general sentiment, but I do not agree with the wording at all. The way this is worded makes it sound as though it is just as likely that the disciples believed that Jesus was resurrected as it is that he really was resurrected, which is not the case at all. As far as I can, most scholars, if not the vast majority of them, seem to widely accept that Jesus's disciples genuinely believed he was resurrected, but very few secular historians would accept the claim that he really was. --Katolophyromai (talk) 17:33, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually the proposed content doesn't make any claims about reality. It describes arguments made by some apologists and scholars. That's all it does.  With respect to the last bit, that could be more clear, I agree.  In any case, please feel free to proliferate proposals -- I was hinting at that with "proposal 1. Or suggest an amendment here.  Thanks Jytdog (talk) 17:51, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The phrase "that these events actually happened" is clearly referring to claims that he was really resurrected and the fact that this statement is presented alongside and in parallel wording with the statement that their beliefs were genuine implies that both possibilities are seen as equally probable. Furthermore, presenting apologists and scholars together makes it sound as though they belong in the same category. I see no reason to include mention of the apologists' claims about the resurrection here. It is better to just stick with what scholars say on the subject. --Katolophyromai (talk) 18:06, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I already understood that and said that I understood that. It is just matter of writing - please offer an amendment or a proposal of your own, if you like. Jytdog (talk) 18:47, 27 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Oppose. That people who "experienced" the resurrection of Jesus died for their faith is controversial/lacking historical evidence. It is plausible that James, the brother of Jesus died because of his position. Whether Peter was executed for being a Christian instead of causing uproar or advocating sedition cannot be known. Romans in the beginning did not understand that Christianity is different from Judaism, so they had little reason to persecute Christians for being Christians. As Ehrman states in his TTC courses and Moss agrees, for most of the first 300-400 years of Christianity it wasn't illegal to be a Christian. Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:39, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * User:Tgeorgescu the proposed content says nothing about "experiences". It says "beliefs". It also says "some" Christians died for their beliefs, and makes it clear that some martyrdom narratives are less reliable Please respond to the actual proposal.  Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 17:47, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * My view is that it would unduly legitimize a controversial claim. I don't disagree that apologists have this view, I don't agree that it is a mainstream scholarly view. Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:51, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * When you say "it", it is not clear what which of the four claims you think is FRINGEy. (the proposed content mentions two groups - apologists and scholars and two claims - sincerity of beliefs, and historicity. So four claims of "X says Y."  Which one(s) of the four?   Also, this is hard question, but what sources support your view that about "not mainstream"?  Please try to avoid making arguments based on personal views. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 17:56, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't deny sincerity of beliefs. I deny that it is an established fact of history that earliest Christians died for their faith. Apologists state that it would be a fact of history. I have quoted above Ehrman, who says that the argument "Christ was really resurrected because the witnesses of the resurrection died for the faith" is a weak argument because there is no evidence that earliest Christians died for their faith. Moss agrees with this lack of evidence (see the quotes I offered above). Tgeorgescu (talk) 18:02, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I have the Moss book. In the version I have, page 136 is a page of footnotes to the introduction and does not say that there were no early Christian martyrs. I do not see anywhere, were Moss says that were no martyrs. Please provide more context so I can find it. (Moss is making an argument in the book that throughout the history of christianity there have been many MANY unsubstantiated stories of martyrdom and these stories are being used today among some Christians to depict a world where Christians are under threat. That is a fine argument.  But it does not require denying all martrydom and I doubt that a scholar as qualified as Moss would make such a claim. But I look forward to more description of the part of the book you are citing.) Jytdog (talk) 18:36, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * She does not prove a negative. She states that there is (almost) no evidence for the apostles being martyred. Ehrman concedes about James. About Stephen he stated that Stephen was not reported as a witness to the resurrection, nor was Stephen a disciple. Some read the Bible as saying that Peter was martyred. Ehrman states that the Bible does not talk much about the lives of the twelve apostles, much less of their deaths. Tgeorgescu (talk) 18:55, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * She doesn't have to prove a negative; her goal is only to say that the stories about then are unreliable and are being pushed way too hard today. You are ironically doing what she warns against, pushing it too hard the other way. If you want to argue that there were no Christian martyrs then you need to bring a source that says that. If you are not arguing that there were no Christian martrys, then you are not responding to the actual proposal, and I will again ask you to focus on actual content. Your objection is, as of now, not based on sources and I will not be replying in this thread to you further, until you start to use this talk page appropriately. Jytdog (talk) 18:59, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * What she wrote is "we simply don't know how any of the apostles died, much less whether they were martyred." That's what I was saying. I did not say that there were no early Christians martyred (since early Christians existed for 200-300 years). Tgeorgescu (talk) 19:07, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The content does not say "apostles". See your talk page. Jytdog (talk) 19:13, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

proposal 2
Some early Christians died for their beliefs about Jesus' actions, death, and resurrection. Some martyrdom narratives from the early Church are less reliable than others and many cannot be verified.
 * sources

-- Jytdog (talk) 18:44, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * This could go at the end of Jesus.

Discussion of proposal 2
If we cannot find a way to relate martyrdoms and historicity (and I am not sure we will), then we can put this in the Early church section. There is no need to mention "sincerity of beliefs" as that is incorporated in "died for their beliefs". Jytdog (talk) 18:44, 27 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Well, I agree that there were at least some early Christians who died for their beliefs, especially when martyrdom had become popular and people sought martyrdom was a way of receiving great rewards in heavens. "Early Christians" do not necessarily mean the initial group of Christians who claimed that they saw Jesus resurrected. Tgeorgescu (talk) 19:03, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The content, again, says nothing about "seeing" or "experiences". Again, see your talk page. Jytdog (talk) 19:13, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

Support for either proposals
So far no one has expressed support for either proposal. We can't reach a consensus if keep going this way. Let's put our opinions below so we may reach a consensus.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 09:29, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
 * What people have said, is that nothing along these lines belongs in this page. I am OK with that. I just wanted to put out there what kind of content might work, and where. Jytdog (talk) 01:49, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

The founder of western civilization
Regarding the current edit warring going on about the founder of western civilization, the one thing I would hope everyone can agree on, is that it wasn't just one person. If you had to pick three, Alexander the Great is clearly one of them, and numerous ancient accounts of his exploits survive. Socrates might be a contender, except that nobody ever would have heard of Socrates (who didn't write at all) were it not for Plato. Similarly, most historians would agree that no one would ever have heard of Jesus, were it not for Paul of Tarsus. So, Alexander, Plato, and Paul get my vote for the top three. But if I got another pick, I'd add Themistocles, who saved western democracy from extinction when it was only 27 years old. Not sure who I'd go with for #5; maybe Constantine. Mathglot (talk) 07:26, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * "the" does not necessary mean "one", it could be something particular ("The Colloseum does not mean there is only one colloseum for example) An example is here from one of the sources:"." Notice that Jesus is one of two, but is stll THE foundation of Western civilization. And "no one would ever have heard of Jesus, were it not for Paul of Tarsus" has no relevance to whether he is a particular founder or not.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 10:39, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * First of all, the use if the definitive article in this instance clearly implies that he is the one and only "founder of Western civilization," because there is nothing in the sentence you wrote that would indicate otherwise. If you had wanted it to be read that he was one of several founders, then you should have either written that he is "a founder of western civilization" or "along with Socrates, Plato, and others, he is the/a [whichever you prefer] founder of western civilization." Just because a definitive article does not always imply singularity does not alleviate the fact that it does in this instance. Secondly, very few modern historians would subscribe to the outdated notion that Western Civilization is the product of a few "great men" because (1) immeasurably many "great men" have contributed to it over the course of its 3,000-or-so-year history and (2) because all "great men" (even Socrates, Plato, and Jesus) are products of the societies in which they live. If you want to talk about "founders" of Western Civilization, then you really have the name whole societies: the Sumerians, the Babylonians, the Egyptians, the Greeks, the Jews, the Romans, the Germans, etc. It is quite a long list, actually. We should not unduely promote a single, rather outdated opinion in the first paragraph of the lead. Finally, the first paragraph should explain basically the most intrinsic aspects of the person, what everyone thinks of when they think of Jesus. Not many people immediately think, "Oh, yeah, the founder of Western Civilization!" They more likely think, "Oh, yeah, Jewish guy. Told a lot of stories about religion and ethics. Christians say he was God," which is more-or-less what the current lead describes. --Katolophyromai (talk) 11:06, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * 1. Then I will use "a particular founder" instead (which was actually the original wording I put in until HiLo challenged it for nonsensical reasons; if you check the edit history you will see that2. Not "outdated", one source is from 2002. Please provide a source for your claim, and even hen "outdated" would still be an overgeneralization. 3. This article is not about Jesus in Christianity", this article is about Jesus in Christianity plus Jesus in scholarship; "Oh, yeah, the founder of Western Civilization!" is what most scholars think of when they think of Jesus.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 11:15, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Umm... No. I have read an exhuberant number of scholarly books about the historical Jesus and interestingly not a single one of them that I can recall even mentions anything about him being the "founder of Western Civilization." Certainly, that is not the first thing any scholar will think about him. --Katolophyromai (talk) 12:01, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Sorry, but "particular founder" makes no sense at all. I am concerned about suggestions that the "civilisation" I am part of was created by someone we cannot even prove existed. HiLo48 (talk) 11:18, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree that "particular founder" makes no sense. Regarding Jesus's historical existence, we have been through this time and time again on this talk page; he certainly existed, as any competent historian will tell you. Our strongest witness to Jesus's historicity are the eight authentic surviving epistle of the apostle Paul. In Paul's Epistle to the Galatians, written probably only around sixteen tears after Jesus's death, making it, by ancient standards, a very early testimony, he tells us that he has met Jesus's brother James and knows him personally. If Jesus was not a real person, his brother would certainly be the one to know. There are also dozens of references to Jesus as a recent historical figure throughout Paul's other letters, which Mythicists merely dismiss with ad hoc explanations. The gospels, while clearly embellished with legends and later fictions, also contain pieces of information that only make any sense at all if they are historical, such as the fact that Jesus came from Nazareth, Jesus's baptism by John the Baptist, and Jesus's crucifixion by the Romans. These are all things that early Christians would never have made up in a million years and would never have said unless they were historical facts that everyone else knew. These were all things that would have been utterly humiliating for any sane-minded person in the ancient world to say about their savior. Nazareth was a tiny, worthless cow-town, not at all a place for the Savior of the world to come from. Being baptized by someone else implied that the other person was spiritually superior to the one being baptized and also implied that the one being baptized had sins that needed to be forgiven. Crucifixion was seen as the absolute most degrading, disgraceful, horrifying way a person could possibly be executed, a punishment suitable only for slaves and the worst of criminals. In fact, the gospel-writers go to great lengths trying to explain these facts away. For further information, here is a link to my extremely abbreviated, but generally adequate, summary of the compelling evidence for the existence of a historical Jesus: . --Katolophyromai (talk) 12:01, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Note that all I said was that we could not prove Jesus existed. That simply has to be true for something that allegedly occurred 2000 years ago. I did not say that he did not exist. Yet you respond with absolute certainty that he did exist. That's the problem with religious stuff. You responded to my expression of doubt with absolute certainty. It's not logical. HiLo48 (talk) 12:17, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Proof is for math and whisky. Tgeorgescu (talk) 12:20, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I did not "respond with absolute certainty"; I am saying that it is as certain as history can be. Sure, it is hypothetically possible that, maybe, if there was a massive, organized conspiracy in the first century to forge evidence of his existence, then maybe it is possible that he might not have existed, but that is such a wildly unlikely possibility given the surviving evidence that it simply is not a reasonable conclusion. We cannot empirically "prove" history, despite what crackpots may say, because that is inherently not how history works. We have to rely on evidence and documents that have survived from the past. We cannot travel back in time and meet Jesus (or any other historical figure) in person to confirm that he existed. --Katolophyromai (talk) 14:30, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * User:HiLo48, don't be disingenuous. Any sane person will take your comment as understood to be referring to the Christ myth theory, especially the context. It is also understood that Katolophyromai's statement came with the given assumption that it is talking about stuff we do know. It is also clear that you are an attention hog. And don't respond any further-your nonsensical claims do not contribute anything o the encyclopedia. ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 12:27, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Please cite the grammatical rules I violated with "particular founder"-or are you just here to get attention? Your comment is absolute proof that you are biased in this regard; what you say here therefore doesn't count.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 11:42, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

This might make for an interesting classroom discussion. I don't see any place for it in an encyclopedia. O3000 (talk) 12:04, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Okay, I will use "a" then. User:Objective3000 If you are talking about "existence", Katolophyromai was just replying to HiLo. If you are talking about this section: it is about improving the article-nothing more needs to be said. User:Katolophyromai, do you have any further concerns with adding the content as it is now, but with "a" instead of "the"?ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk)


 * I see no historical consensus on any particular folk comprising the founders of Western civilization. O3000 (talk) 12:27, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Please read the sources before you comment. what you said is patently not true, there is a general consensus that certain men founded western civilization, only with generally slightly differing emphasesScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 12:31, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * User:Katolophyromai, perhaps you are right on it not being the first thing scholars think about, but it is still what makes him notable. I'm pretty sure the first paragraph contains what is most important about a person, now what is most "intrinsic". If the latter were the case then maybe we might be promoting misconceptions in the leads. I've responded to your concerns, do you have any further responses/concerns?ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 12:37, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * You have addressed my first criticism, but you have totally ignored my second and third. It is not reasonable to describe anyone as the "founder of Western Civilization," not even Jesus, despite the obvious influence he has had on it. --Katolophyromai (talk) 14:30, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, you've provided two sources of one source, which is the musings of Nietzsche. This isn’t close to establishing anyone as a founder of Western Civilization, particularly a Middle Eastern guy from before the Dark Ages, 13 centuries before the Renaissance. O3000 (talk) 12:40, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * They're more than musings of Nietsche, they are commentaries on Nietsche. And don't speak like that when you don't even know that there is no such as a "Dark Ages". Here's a sample:"the dominant view of Jesus in this historicist Kultur-Protestantismus is that Jesus (usually along with Socrates) is the foundation of Western civilization". Quite a consensus, eh? I could bring in many more sources if you want.

Also, "Middle Eastern" is misleading-the Middle East he was born into, was not the present-day Middle East, even culturally. ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 13:38, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Googling "founder of Western Civilization" and choosing images returns a bunch of hits for The School of Athens, but not a single image of Jesus. Indeed, (excluding the famous fresco) I've so far found Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Albert Einstein, Steven Hawking, Christopher Columbus, Moses, Napoleon Bonaparte, Atilla the Hun, Some fictional black Roman Centurion that the political right went apeshit over a few years ago, Ghandi, Stefan "Could he possibly really be that dumb?" Molyneux, Caesar, Jordan "Duh, Imma give talks like I don't know shit about the subject I have a PhD in" Peterson, Malcolm X, a statue that might be Sargon of Akkad but probably isn't, Paul of Tarsus, Leonardo DaVinci, Alexander the great, a bunch of random teenagers posing in front of American monuments, a bunch of random tweens posing with margaritas, Adolph "Wargle blargle" Hitler, random folks from the middle ages through the early modern period and Edward Motherfucking Snowden, but not a single Jesus.
 * Think about the fact that I get (multiple) hits for Stefan Molyneux, who could find a feminist conspiracy in a Gor movie and would definitely make a youtube video whining about it, but not a single hit for Jesus. Clearly: the internet and my highly-academic-and-hardly-political google history both think that random idiots bemoaning the fall of Western Civilization (at the hands of women, naturally) for dat Youtube money is more relevant to the phrase "founder of Western Civilization" than Jesus is.
 * So I'm going to go out on a limb and say this is WP:UNDUE. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  13:44, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * "What do I think of Western civilization? I think it would be a very good idea." Mahatma Gandhi O3000 (talk) 13:51, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I gave serious thought to giving Gandhi the "motherfucking" sobriquet, just for the sheer awesomeness of so many of his quotes. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  13:56, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Your entire search is bollocks. please don't do "images", which is of course is not going to give you anything, but please use Books. And your comments here are suspiciously promotive and WP:FORUM-like. I have found endless SCHOLARLY sources citing Jesus as the foundation of Western civilization, which is far more indicative of what scholars think than your shitty Google image searchScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 14:09, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * You've found "endless" scholarly sources, have you? I await your list with baited breath. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  14:19, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * PS: Please refrain from throwing a hissy fit over people pointing out problems with your position; it'll save us the trouble of having to drag an admin in to block you. Thanks. ;D ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  14:22, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * 1.I don't need to list them as one source already states this is the dominant position :that Jesus is one of the people listed among the Human foundations of the West.

I do have them all right, but listing them is tacky-I'll do it tomorrow, as I am a human being and need to sleep. (Also, why demand a list, when you could easily search them for your self?) Buh-bye.

And I sense that you are just doing this based on your personal feelings, given you tones and your promotive c and forum-like comments above.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 14:30, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * See WP:BURDEN and WP:TERTIARY. You have one source that presented that author's opinion that Jesus is one of many founders within a specific context.  If the founder bit was due, there would be tertiary sources documenting the argument over the "the vs A" nuance.  "I've got it right now but I'm not going to show you" stops being believable after second grade.  "I have a girlfriend but she goes to another school... in another country... and her modelling career takes her all around the world" at least displaces the proof. Ian.thomson (talk) 14:37, 21 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I think what ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants is getting at is that even Western Christians during the Renaissance, who could only think in terms of "Western Christian society = modern civilization (no distinction possible)" did not consider Jesus to be the founder (much less a founder) of their civilization.
 * What we have so far is one source that lists Jesus as one among many founders within a very specific context, and a quite significant absence of anything remotely similar elsewhere. If the statement is anywhere near due weight, then anyone would be able to find multiple sources not only arguing over whether or not Jesus was a founder, but arguing "the" vs "a," especially tertiary sources documenting the argument between the two.  Ian.thomson (talk) 14:28, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Ian, that is because the comprehensive study of western civilization did not really exist during the Renaissance, but only began during the 19th century. Also, some stuff that is notable among scholars do not make it to pop knowledge or even many high school textbooks-like Hebraism, even though as important as Hellenism, far morepeople are aware of the significance of Hellenism than they are of Hebraism, and the same seems to be the case for tertiary sourcs. The inverse is also true of largely unscholarly ideas-like the Dark Ages; most people still believe that, and it is still emphasized strongly in tertiary works, despite scholarly scrutiny.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 14:37, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Western Christians during the middle ages and renaissance believed that Jesus was their highest king and that the guy on the local throne was Christ's political regent as the Pope was Christ's spiritual regent. To have even implied otherwise back then would have gotten one into a lot of trouble.  The only reason for them to have not listed Jesus as the founder of their civilization would be if they looked around and said "ok, our philosophy ultimately traces back to Socrates or Zoroaster, our laws to Solon and Moses, our military to Alexander the Great, and our religion to Abraham..."  Jesus was the central point but still not the founder.  Also, the study of Hebraism by gentiles and discussion on Hebraism's influence on western culture begins in the Renaissance.  Ian.thomson (talk) 14:54, 21 June 2018 (UTC)


 * So far, the argument is "I have tons of sources, and you all need to take my word for it because I showed you one source". I think we all know what that argument's worth, so it appears that we're done here. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  14:39, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Agreed. --Katolophyromai (talk) 14:46, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Also, a lot of aspersions are being cast: look at both responses to me, as well as the section below. That's not indicative of a productive discussion. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  14:47, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * This is a silly discussion. There is no "founder of western civilisation." WP proceeds by consensus and it should be clear, ScepticismOfPopularisation that there is no consensus for your proposed edit. Please drop it.Smeat75 (talk) 14:52, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Ian.thomson., much of your comment only affirms my points. s for the last line, Hebraism=?=Western civilization, and that is very obviously because of their religiosity rather than out of any secular comprehensive take on the subject. MjolnirPants, if a single reliable source says "this is the consensus", then that is enough and I said that, contrary to what you portrayed I said, if you need more I'll post them, but only tomorrow after I get up. I never said that you be take my word for it because of one source, so no that is not my argument. Smeat75, there is no consensus because the discussion isn't even really over yet. Responses like "We all know how much that argument's worth" is indicative of incompetence in preventing one's feelings from interfering. There is one thing all of you have in common, and it is that all of your liberals. Your responses lack scholarly argument and seem to trend towards dismissing this discussion despite it not being over. This is evidence of a slight liberal COI on your parts.

For now: Of course I will post my sources, but tomorrow after I wake up.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 15:16, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Show me a single, reliable source saying "The consensus of Historians is that Jesus is the founder of Western Civilization." You haven't even come close to that, and you've reacted to all criticism like a child; playing rhetorical games and trying to shift the focus to shit-talking me. The best advice for you is the first law of holes. Stop digging; you're not going anywhere but down. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  15:27, 21 June 2018 (UTC)


 * this diff is the one we are discussing. I oppose this because:
 * a) it is not summarizing anything in the body
 * b) it is an overstatement
 * I also note that it has no support here except for its proposer. I suggest the proposer drop this. Jytdog (talk) 15:37, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * a)It is the most important thing,like "centralfigure ofChristianity'
 * b) Nothing is an overstatement if it is reliably sourced


 * Don't do that when I haven't even posted my sources yet. And please everyone, stop responding until I present my sources- I'm only responding right now because I delayed my usual sleeping hours.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 16:40, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * "Like a child is a nice insult considering that you don't seem to understand that I am going to present all my sources TOMORROW Stop spewing rhetoric that you know is unnecessary. I f you respond further, everyone will see that you don't understand that the source will come TOMORROW. And please stop responding until I show my sources, per above. Any response like the one you posted above will be seen as offensive, and, truly, a personal attack- it is pretty clearly defamatory in nature, unlike my simple accusations of COI.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 16:49, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * How old are you? ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  16:54, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

"Not in lead"
This suggestion seems to be more out of personal distaste/whims than out of any sincere suggestion to build an encyclopedia.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 10:06, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Policies and guidelines exist for good reason, and departing from the requires good reason. WP:LEAD has been part of the manual of style for a very long time. Jytdog (talk) 15:39, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * "central figure of Christianity" is not in the body either. Don't respond until the above discussion ensues, when I wake upScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 16:49, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * If I may offer some viewpoints from an outside perspective. 1. This discussion is devolving into personal attacks. I would recommend everyone just step back for a day or two. 2. As "the founder of Western civilization", or any adjacent statement, is inherently subjective, a WP article only can factually comment on whether certain scholars of note consider it to be true. In my opinion, only unanimous (or at least supermajority) factual information belongs in the lede of any article.  3. My recommendation is that any such statement does NOT belong in the lede, but, I think it could have a fit in the article. Perhaps expanding on the impact Jesus had on western civilization would fit into the "Historical views" section, or its own, entirely new, section. Jtrevor99 (talk) 16:56, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Any edit claiming Jesus as "the founder of Western civilization" would have to be backed by evidence that Western civilization did not exist prior to Jesus, and that would be hard to do since ancient Greece and ancient Rome are agreed to have been important elements of Western civilization.Smeat75 (talk) 17:06, 21 June 2018 (UTC)


 * NOTE: has been confirmed by a checkuser as a sockpuppet of LittleDipper.  I think we can probably archive this discussion now.  Ian.thomson (talk) 17:08, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

Date of death
Surprisingly, there is no section called "Death of Jesus" or similar in the article. The more religious-based #Life and teachings section has a subsection #Crucifixion and entombment which is entirely appropriate there, but which does not discuss the date of death directly. This makes sense the framework of the religious orientation of that section, where the date has lesser importance. However, the following major section #Historical views also does not discuss the date of Jesus' death directly. The subsection #Passover and crucifixion discusses it indirectly. The closest one can come in that section to learning the date of death, is that he died shortly after Passover, but even that is not stated unambiguously.

It seems to me the date of Jesus' death needs its own subsection to discuss. (And maybe a FAQ entry.) For one thing, as I recall from reading Bart Ehrman (forget which one, maybe Misquoting Jesus), that depending on which gospel you trust, it's not clear whether he died on a Friday or a Saturday. Secondly, for other reasons, it's not clear whether he was 30 or 33, and I can't remember if this is because of uncertainty of his birth year, or death year. All of this should be laid out somewhere in a subsection of #Historical views. (I can probably locate the Ehrman citation, if no one else has it.) Mathglot (talk) 23:15, 30 April 2018 (UTC)


 * Anyone? When did he die?  Mathglot (talk) 04:12, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 30 or 33. StAnselm (talk) 04:34, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

The Friday before the first Easter. Cowboysfan3214 (talk) 01:42, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

1 Peter 3:22 and the ascension
StAnselm, I can't find anything in that source about 1 Peter 3:22. The source is Craig Evans 2003, citing pages pages 521-530. That range of pages is of course too wide, citations should zero in on a page or two, but though a few pages are missing in google books, in those available there's not a single mention of 1 Peter so far as I can see.

Ascension and exaltation are quite separate doctrines. 1 Peter 3:22 says that Jesus Christ "has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand", but that the enthronement or exaltation or whatever you might call it (exaltation is the phrase I know, and we have an article on it called the Session of Christ, which is new one for me). Anyway, the Ascension of Jesus is the act of Jesus leaving Earth for Heaven, and the enthronement is what happens after he gets there - he sits on God's right hand "commanding angels", the most exalted of all heavenly beings beside God himself. So far as I know the enthronement is pretty frequently mentioned in the NT writings (at the core of Paul's conception of Christ's saving mission), but Luke-Acts is the only place the ascension is described. PiCo (talk) 07:28, 27 June 2018 (UTC)
 * 1 Peter 3:22 talks about both. Luke is "by no means the only New Testament writer who refers to the event". (It's also a major theme in Hebrews.) StAnselm (talk) 08:40, 27 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks, but the question is specifically whether Evans's book contains a reference to 1 Peter 3:22 in pages 521-30. Some pages are not shown in google books, but I can't find anything in the pages that are available.PiCo (talk) 01:53, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
 * It's important to make a distinction between the ascension and the enthronement. The ascension is the single act of movement from Earth to Heaven, the enthronement is his being seated at God's right hand with power over angels and hosts. The second has profound theological significance, the first does not.PiCo (talk) 01:56, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
 * The ascension does have profound theological significance in Hebrews, where it is compared to the High Priest entering the Holy of Holies. Anyway, seeing the ascension is 1 Peter 3;22 is not particularly controversial, and there are lots of other references we could use instead of Evans. StAnselm (talk) 02:35, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Lede: a Divine Trinity vs the Divine Trinity vs The Holy Trinity.
a phrase in the lead goes like " The great majority of Christians worship Jesus as the incarnation of God the Son, the second of three persons of a Divine Trinity"

The phrase sounds despective, like being written from a hatred fueled secular atheist view, and atheism is a very biased point of view, of course there are atheist views on Jesus that could e taken into account, but the phrase will sound more recopilatory, as an encyclopedia should, if instead of "a Divine Trinity", which would open the possibility for many Divine Trinities to be followed in Christianity (some people would say there are many trinities, like: Joseph, Mary, Jesus; or Michael, Raphael, Gabriel; or Peter, John, James;etc) but officially there is only one, that is, "The Divine Trinity" or most commonly used "The Holy Trinity", therefore "a Divine Trinity" should be replaced by "The Holy Trinity" because otherwise the Wikipedia definition wouldn't exactly comply to the official definition on the subject, and it'd be an original work not a summarization of knowledge. 181.56.97.143 (talk) 07:30, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * IP wrote: written from a hatred fueled secular atheist view, and atheism is a very biased point of view. No, it is written from a neutral point of view, as per the pillars of Wikipedia. And please, keep your personal opinions about atheism out of here. O3000 (talk) 10:23, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * "Divine Trinity" and "Holy Trinity" have basically the same meaning, but "Holy Trinity" is the more commonly used term. "Divine Trinity" does make the meaning of the phrase more explicit, though, which is probably the reason why it is used here. I am guessing the reason the word "a" was originally used here was because of the existence of triple deities in other religious traditions outside of Christianity, but it is misleading here for two reasons:
 * It seems to imply that Christians believe in other Trinities, which is not accurate, because Christians only believe in one Trinity, which is the Holy Trinity.
 * Triple deities outside of Christianity have very different origins from the Christian Trinity. The Christian Trinity was proposed as a resolution to the apparent problem that both Jesus and God the Father are called "God" in the New Testament, but both the Old and New Testaments affirm the oneness of God; whereas, non-Christian triple deities developed for other reasons. Lumping them all together as "Divine Trinities" is probably not the best approach.
 * I will change the "a" to "the" as a resolution to the two problems I have identified above. I will, however, leave the phrase "Divine Trinity," even though it is less commonly used, because its meaning is more explicitly clear than for the equivalent phrase "Holy Trinity." I think the phrase "Divine Trinity" will be easier to understand for non-Christian readers who have potentially never heard of the "Holy Trinity." --Katolophyromai (talk) 12:46, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree that "divine" is more specific than "holy" and I strongly prefer "the" to "a". Within the worldview of Christianity (a perspective from which much of this article must necessarily be written), there is only one trinity. From a worldwide perspective, there is no divine trinity that even comes close to the prominence of the Christian one. Hell, there may -in fact- not even be any divine trinities, only "holy" trinities (such as the Norns). ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  15:56, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * The word trinity is almost explicitly Christian. For comparable concepts in other religions, such as Trimurti, we have Triple deity (...which needs an overhaul because it's full of fluffy bunny OR, and which combines "this is a single deity with three forms/masks/avatars" with "these are three historically distinct deities that came to be worshiped as a group"). Ian.thomson (talk) 16:26, 8 July 2018 (UTC)


 * none of the above the WL is "trinity" and that is fine. Did that here. We don't need the adjective. Jytdog (talk) 16:23, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I like that. No need for the adjective. O3000 (talk) 17:48, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I have no objections to just saying "the Trinity." We appear to have a consensus, as far as I can tell. --Katolophyromai (talk) 17:55, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

Jesus himself is a god?
were this two the same?. Hansonjay (t@lk) 06:06, 21 May 2018 (utc)
 * The talk page is not a forum, it is for talking about possible improvements for the article.ScepticismOfPopularisation (talk) 10:33, 21 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Jesus is traditionally identified in orthodox theology as God the Son, one of the three hypostases ("persons") of the Trinity. I would recommend reading the article God in Christianity for further information. --Katolophyromai (talk) 12:55, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

Jesus is not only 2 at the same time he is 3 the father the son and the holy spirit and yes he is a God (with a capital g) Meldoythemush (talk) 20:29, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually, according to orthodox Christian theology, Jesus is only God the Son; God the Father and the Holy Spirit are both distinct from him. The worldview you are describing, in which Jesus, the Father, and the Holy Spirit are all the same, is known as Modalistic Monarchianism. It was rejected as heretical during the Patristic Era. The main reason for the rejection of it is that Jesus, at various points in the canonical gospels, refers to the Father and the Holy Spirit as separate from himself. For instance, Jesus prays to the Father in Gethsemane (as described in, , and ); obviously, he cannot have prayed to himself, so people concluded that God the Father must be separate and distinguishable. Also, people were seriously disturbed by the idea of patripassianism (literally "Father-suffering"), an implication of Modalistic Monarchianism, which is that God the Father, the mighty creator of the universe and God of the Old Testament, suffered on the cross. The Trinity, as traditionally conceived, holds that each of its three "persons" (or hypostases) are separate and distinct from each other, but still aspects of one singular, unified Deity. In any case, this has nothing to do with suggestions for improvements to the article, so I am closing this discussion as off-topic and forum-like. --Katolophyromai (talk) 21:27, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

== Holy Trinity vs Trinity: calling to discuss the matter on the Talk:Trinity article ==

The official definition is Holy Trinity not Divine Trinity, nor is it Trinity.

The article for Trinity is the one that is carrying an "original work" in stating that the official definition for the Triune God is "Trinity", when in reality they refer to the Triune God, officially, as the Holy Trinity, with Trinity or Blessed Trinity, or even Most Holy Trinity, used depending on the context. So in other to accomodate the correct official wording, let us remember that wikipedia is not here to re-invent definitions and that every information has to be the way it is officially stated by the sources. please do comment on the talk page of the Trinity article where this discussion should be moved to before any changes are introduced here (in this article)Ctmv (talk) 02:44, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

Jewish vs Judean
In my opinion, the constant use of the term Jewish should be replaced with the term Judean as there is a large difference between what we call Jews and Judaism today and the Judeans of the Bible. In addition, the use of the term rabbi is also extremely misleading and, in its context in the bible, simply sounds as if it is a synonym for teacher, rather than the Jewish religious leaders we call rabbis today. — Preceding unsigned comment added by HBBorges (talk • contribs) 17:17, 22 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, we stick to professionally-published mainstream academic sources -- not to editor opinion (or even original research). Ian.thomson (talk) 17:20, 22 May 2018 (UTC)


 * this is an editor who replaced "antisemitic" with the white separatist term "counter-semitic" and is editwarring at an article to remove categories relating to Jews instead of adding a source which shows Funk meets the categories. There are more, see his contributions.. Doug Weller  talk 17:48, 22 May 2018 (UTC)


 * And right or wrong, I wonder how he ended up at Talk:Donát Bánki? You get one guess. And there's - and more, the list goes on.  Doug Weller  talk 17:52, 22 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Ok, so he's WP:NOTHERE. I'm blocking then.  Ian.thomson (talk) 19:57, 22 May 2018 (UTC)


 * The person who added "Jewish" into the lede is an antitheist and Ian's page speaks for itself.  The word is there to dissuade Christians from the antisemitism that ought to be a part of their (and everyone else's) belief systems, because Wikipedia in 2018 is Jewish propaganda.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.102.148.156 (talk) 05:18, 11 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Wow! HiLo48 (talk) 05:37, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia is not a platform for promoting antisemitism. Users attempting to use Wikipedia as a platform to promote antisemitism have no place in the community and may be blocked per WP:NOTHERE. This discussion is over. --Katolophyromai (talk) 06:36, 11 July 2018 (UTC)

Surface-waterwalking or swimming with style?
The NHK World showed an updated form of mizugumo. It's not designed for surface-waterwalking, neither is useful enough. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:2149:821E:7800:F93C:28ED:282B:C51B (talk) 00:46, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
 * This is not relevant, unless you have a specific change you would like to propose we make to the article. --Katolophyromai (talk) 01:32, 13 June 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 16 August 2018
Jesus[e] (c. 4 BC – c. AD 30 / 33), also referred to as Jesus of Nazareth and Jesus Christ,[f] is The Lord and The way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Jesus. (Messiah).[12] He is the central figure of Christianity. Jews and Christians believe he is the incarnation of God the Son and the awaited Messiah (Christ) prophesied in the Old Testament.[13][14] Lbt018 (talk) 16:00, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * ❌ Wikipedia does not make decisions regarding what religion the reader should believe. Also, Judaism can almost be defined by their rejection of Jesus. Ian.thomson (talk) 16:03, 16 August 2018 (UTC)
 * "the awaited Messiah (Christ) prophesied in the Old Testament" Last I checked, the Messiah was supposed to accomplish "the unification of the tribes of Israel, the gathering of all Jews to Eretz Israel, the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem, the ushering in of a Messianic Age of global universal peace". Jesus performed none of these tasks. As a Messiah, he seems to have been a complete failure. Dimadick (talk) 18:33, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
 * We all have a bad millennium or two now and again. O3000 (talk) 18:39, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
 * It all depends on what one's definition of a "Messiah" is. Jesus certainly was not the kind of Messiah that most Messiah-awaiting Jews of his time period would have been expecting, but the word itself simply means "anointed one" and it has been applied throughout history to many very different kinds of people, including even Cyrus the Great in . It is not possible to give a single definitive answer on what the "Messiah" was "supposed to" do, because no one ever really agreed on that in antiquity and they still do not agree on it today. In any case, I think it should be obvious that this discussion is over. We are an encyclopedia and we do not make suggestions on what people are supposed to believe or not believe on the subject of religion. --Katolophyromai (talk) 19:00, 23 August 2018 (UTC)

New atricle
The new article Mental health of Jesus really needs help.--Moxy (talk) 21:37, 27 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Clearly. And perhaps it should be merged with Criticism of Jesus. O3000 (talk) 21:48, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 10 September 2018
HE'S NOT REAL 59.100.175.25 (talk) 04:27, 10 September 2018 (UTC)
 * We have already discussed this thousands of times before; regardless of whether you think Jesus was a god, or the Messiah, or whatever, he certainly was a real person who lived in Galilee during the early first century AD. This is a fact on which every reputable historian who has studied the ancient world agrees, based on a massive amount of clear and irrefutable historical evidence. Additionally, even if Jesus were not a real person, he would certainly be a notable legendary figure, since he is revered by over a billion people worldwide and his life is the focus of the most widely-practiced religion on earth. We have an article about Heracles, for instance, who probably was not a real person, but he is a notable legendary figure. --Katolophyromai (talk) 04:39, 10 September 2018 (UTC)
 * While I agree there is no point trying to address this "question", the certainty of the answer is unhelpfuly problematic, and shows a non-neutral POV. HiLo48 (talk) 08:13, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

The name
Among English-speaking Christians, the name "Jesus" is often used to refer to God, which is to say the spirit of Christ, or the union of both God and Jesus, as such as there is the one represents for the other. Presumably its the same with the use of the name Jesus in other languages. -Inowen (nlfte) 07:23, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Regardless of how the name "Jesus" is colloquially used in some present-day Christian circles, in traditional, orthodox Christian theology, Jesus has always been regarded as separate and distinct from God the Father. There were multiple controversies regarding the exact relationship between Jesus and God the Father in the second, third, fourth, and fifth centuries. The view that sees Jesus and God the Father as the same is known as Modalistic Monarchianism and was declared to be heretical. A main argument against it is the fact that, throughout the New Testament, Jesus prays to God the Father, so, if Jesus and God the Father are the same, who is he praying to? Himself? Jesus also frequently refers to God the Father in the gospels in ways that clearly seem to imply that He is a separate entity. Another problem is that Modalistic Monarchianism inherently implies Patripassianism, which is a rather disturbing implication that most Christians, especially in antiquity, were rather eager to circumvent. --Katolophyromai (talk) 04:56, 10 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Honoring the basic fact as you state that God the Father is God, and Jesus his Son is a separate being, "I and the Father speak as one" has theological meaning, where the Son represents for the Father, and the Father for the Son. This is an old Jewish custom when there is business to be conducted. -Inowen (nlfte) 22:56, 11 September 2018 (UTC)


 * All Wikipedia does is cite, summarize, and paraphrase professionally-published mainstream academic or journalistic sources, without commentary. We don't use original research.  Ian.thomson (talk) 22:59, 11 September 2018 (UTC)
 * This is not original research. This is basic Christian theology. God himself is a 'man from another place' and has a quantum body which is not human, made Jesus through parthenogenisis to prove his existence, and then Father and Son together represent for each other to bring Man to a realization of the Truth, and to a new age where love and harmony reign on Earth. -Inowen (nlfte) 23:06, 11 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Uh-huh. Professionally-published mainstream academic or journalistic sources that summarize Christian doctrine (that is, the stated beliefs of a plurality of Christians or Christian groups; not "the truth") that way? Ian.thomson (talk) 23:13, 11 September 2018 (UTC)
 * I do not know exactly what you are trying to get at. If you are trying to argue for a new conception of the relationship between God the Father and Jesus, then, as has correctly pointed out, I must remind you that Wikipedia is not a theological journal; we are an encyclopedia and we do not publish original ideas. If, however, you are merely confused about what the traditional Christian teaching is on this matter and asking for clarification, then I have posted a diagram illustrating it at right. Hopefully that will adequately explain what most Christians have historically believed and what many continue to believe. Most Christians generally regard Jesus as the human incarnation of God the Son, who is conceived as one of three hypostases within the Godhead, alongside God the Father and the Holy Spirit. --Katolophyromai (talk) 23:16, 11 September 2018 (UTC)
 * No, its just that the usage of the name "Jesus" has a Trinitarian meaning, meaning not exactly just Jesus himself. -Inowen (nlfte) 23:36, 11 September 2018 (UTC)
 * That seriously reminds me of something I read where someone argued that the works of William Shakespeare were not written by William Shakespeare, but by someone named William Shakespeare. Ian.thomson (talk) 23:38, 11 September 2018 (UTC)
 * The name "Jesus" refers to the person Jesus. It can also sometimes be used to refer to God the Son, although the correctness of that usage is debatable. It certainly does not apply to the entire Godhead. In any case, I think we are clearly verging off into WP:OR territory here. --Katolophyromai (talk) 23:47, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

This close of discussion while discussion is ongoing is improper. -Inowen (nlfte) 03:48, 12 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Read the closing summary: no, it's not. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  04:09, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 5 October 2018
Change Birthdate to 0Ad Dipper6603 (talk) 21:32, 5 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Why? Drmies (talk) 21:33, 5 October 2018 (UTC)
 * There was no 0AD. O3000 (talk) 21:36, 5 October 2018 (UTC)
 * BTW, if you are interested in the concept (or non-concept) of zero in various ancient cultures, or the history of calendars, feel free to investigate. The answers lay therein. O3000 (talk) 01:36, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

Update to introduction
I think that the introduction paragraph should be updated to include the fact that Muslims believe that Jesus is a Prophet/messenger of God. This seems appropriate as the introduction paragraph states the Christian view on Jesus, but does not explain the Muslim view of him. Does anyone else have any thoughts on this? Best, Snowsky Mountain (talk) 19:11, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
 * It already is. Read the final paragraph of the lede (the text before the table of contents). ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  19:42, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
 * What I'm proposing is adding it to the end of the first paragraph. The way it is right now, the introduction solely focuses on the Christian view of Jesus, and just leaves non-Christian views of him to the last paragraph of the introduction. In my opinion, adding this information to the end of the first paragraph would balance out the introduction a bit more. (For example, maybe something like, ",while Muslims believe he is a prophet of God" could be added to the end of the first sentence.) Snowsky Mountain (talk) 12:43, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree. But, it's not going to happen. O3000 (talk) 12:47, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * The way it is right now, the introduction solely focuses on the Christian view of Jesus Well, considering that Jesus is a minor figure at best in other religions, but THE central figure of Christianity (which is even named after him), that's to be expected. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  13:39, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * He is arguably a major figure in Islam as well -- there's even a Wikipedia page dedicated to that (Jesus in Islam). Snowsky Mountain (talk) 13:46, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Okay, but is he the central figure in Islam? ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  13:48, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * They consider him the penultimate prophet. O3000 (talk) 13:50, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Right, but what I'm asking is if he is as prominent and important in Islam as in Christianity. Because if not, then it makes more sense to introduce him in the context of Christianity. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  13:59, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, our article says Jesus is the most mentioned person in the Quran by reference. They revere him as a messenger of Allah. But, there are many revered folk in the Bible and Quran, starting with Abraham. And there are Christians that do not believe Jesus is godlike. I also think that the Quran's early and later chapters change in nature, much like the old and new testaments, due to the appearance of Jesus. But, that's OR. I have no dog in this fight as I’m nontheist. I'm just uncomfortable with one religion claiming "ownership" over one religious figure revered by multiple religions. O3000 (talk) 14:22, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * What I'm getting at is that Jesus is most closely associated with Christianity and most important to Christianity. So introducing him in the context of Christianity makes sense.
 * That being said, I wouldn't object to something like "Jesus is the central figure of Christianity and a major or minor figure in other Abrahamic religions." which then goes on to only talk about Christianity for the rest of the paragraph, then moves on to the existing second-through-last paragraphs. So I'm okay with a passing mention, but I think trying to emphasize his role in other religions is highly undue for the lede. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  14:46, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * What other Abrahamic religion than Islam (and Christian offshoots) is he important to, though? He isn't covered by Judaism. Not taking a stand here, just questioning the wording. FunkMonk (talk) 14:56, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Ahh, as far as Judiasm goes, there’s Jews for Jesus. They have a building not one mile from me. There are so many variations on religion. O3000 (talk) 15:06, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * We both live in a majority Christian country. So, it certainly appears to us that Jesus is most closely associated with Christianity. And perhaps that’s true. I wonder what someone living in a majority Muslim, Rastafari or Bahá'í area thinks. Rastafarians believe Haile Selassie is Jesus. But, I’m OK with your wording. O3000 (talk) 15:02, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * This has been discussed before and decided that the role of Jesus in Islam should be discussed in the last paragraph of the lead, not the first.Smeat75 (talk) 15:05, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * That's why I started by saying it's not going to happen. These discussions don't work in this article. O3000 (talk) 15:08, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * I actually used to work in a predominantly Muslim country, and from what little discussion of Jesus there was, he was associated with Christianity and Americans. The same way we associate Abraham with Judaism, even though he plays a role in Christianity, as well. I gotta be honest though, we never much talked about religion. It was just not a smart idea for anyone to get real theological at that time. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  15:15, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, in ten minutes, I can walk to churches, a mosque, Jewish temples, a Shinto shrine, a Buddhist temple, and the Kabbalah Centre. Another 15 minutes to a Scientology church. But, NYers don’t talk about religion. O3000 (talk) 15:30, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Article one sided
The article is one sided to catholic and atheistic beliefs. The studies quoted here are also one sided. My studies about Jesus have historians saying the historical Jesus and biblical Jesus match up. This article need to be more natural if you are going to present this or say this is from the catholic view or atheistic view. Phantomg007 (talk) 17:07, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
 * You do realize that Catholics are Christian, don't you? That they're kinda the opposite of atheists?  Ian.thomson (talk) 17:15, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

@Ian.thomson: A very common misconception catholic and Christian are not the same, Christians believe salvation through Jesus and Catholicism believes salvation through works. You ask an honest Catholic they will tell you they are not Christian, they are Catholic. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Phantomg007 (talk • contribs) 17:21, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
 * No, I know plenty of Catholics and have studied their beliefs. You've just been brainwashed to accept lies that the devil spread to divide Christendom.  Ian.thomson (talk) 17:24, 25 November 2018 (UTC)


 * In the US 62% of Protestants believe both are necessary (although the article is confusing) and 81% of Catholics think both faith and deeds are necessary. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Doug Weller (talk • contribs) 17:44, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
 * My understanding is both Catholics and Calvinists can agree on that if one really did believe, they would carry out good deeds. At any rate, OP has done nothing but try to push his belief that Catholics are not Christians and that mainstream academia is "Catholic," and responded to instructions to stop with the accusation that I'm a Jesuit, so I've blocked them under WP:NOTHERE.  Ian.thomson (talk) 17:54, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 11 October 2018
For the article on Jesus "The Nicene Creed asserts that Jesus will judge the living and the dead[33] either before or after their bodily resurrection,[34][35][36] an event tied to the Second Coming of Jesus in Christian eschatology.[37]"

Request that the preceding sentence be altered to "and the dead before and/or after" etc. Some denominations do not hold this view, but Roman Catholics believe that there are 2 judgments; the particular judgment immediately after a person's death, and the general judgment at the second coming when resurrection of the body would occur. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:548:c101:edbb:5c22:a9e2:439d:ff4e (talk) 19:55, 11 October 2018‎
 * ❌ This needs a reliable source showing that some Christians believe in two judgements. If you find one, feel free to post again and I'll happily make the change. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants   Tell me all about it.  20:21, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
 * I think the whole "either before or after their bodily resurrection" should be removed because the Nicene creed (subject of the sentence) doesn't specify anything: it just says "From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.", period. So it's incorrect to say that the Nicene creed "asserts" further things, that aren't actually there.Bardoligneo (talk) 13:52, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

A link from BC to Anno domini in the first sentence
I would find it quite relevant to have a link from "BC" to Anno Domini in the "(c. 4 BC – c. AD 30 / 33)" in the first sentence, as the "BC" triggers curiosity in the reader about the counting of years before and after Christ, when it was implemented, by whom, how the time of his birth was determined at that time, etc. So I was surprised that there was no link there, as that was where I expected to find such a link. While there would perhaps normally not be a link from "BC" in articles in general, in this case I would find it highly relevant, especially because BC was named after Jesus himself and because of the interesting fact that Christ was born around 4 (2-7) years "before Christ". As recommended in a comment in the article I didn't just add it straight away but wanted to mention it here first in case there are any relevant objections. --Jhertel (talk) 22:23, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 17 December 2018
For notes section, I request to add "Urantia Book writes "... and at noon, August 21, 7 B.C., with the help and kind ministrations of women fellow travelers, Mary was delivered of a male child. Jesus of Nazareth was born into the world, was wrapped in the clothes which Mary had brought along for such a possible contingency, and laid in a near-by manger." - 122:8.1 " --112.205.21.22 (talk) 13:30, 17 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: WP:FRINGE O3000 (talk) 13:37, 17 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: Asked and answered: WP:FRINGE  General Ization Talk  13:56, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 18 December 2018
Please change all references to the name Jesus and replace then with Yeshua or Yehoshua.

Hebrew Source: יְהוֹשׁוּעַ Lexicon Key: H3091

Kind Regards CyberVines (talk) 09:54, 18 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Not done Please see WP:COMMONNAME and WP:UE. Also, few people spoke Hebrew by Jesus's time; yeah, it might be pretty much the same in Aramaic and various other less anachronistic languages, but that doesn't really matter. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 09:57, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

"Scholars regard the gospels as compromised sources of information because the writers were trying to glorify Jesus"
Can I see a quote from Sanders that verifies this text? My understanding is that the reason scholars don't consider the gospels to be particularly useful sources for Jesus's biography is not so much that they were trying to glorify him but that they were only trying to glorify him. The low page number implies we are citing an oversimplified summary of a more complicated point Sanders made later on in the same work. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:40, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree. The source section seems outdated. The first sentences are misleading and do not reflect the current state of scholarship. They rely on a book written in 1985, that cannot take into account new important findings and debates, for example Richard A. Burridge's highly influential book on the Gospels as greco-roman biographies must be cited, the same goes with Richard Bauckham (Jesus and the Eyewitnesses). Thucyd (talk) 20:00, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
 * You appear to be saying the exact opposite of what I'm saying. My problem is that what the second sentence (one of "the first sentences") is trying to say is muted by clumsy (perhaps deliberately so) use of the conjunction "and" rather than "since" or the like, and what it is trying to say is directly contradicted by a sentence further down that appears to misrepresent an oversimplified introduction to Sanders's book. The problem with the gospels is that they are not biographies and are only interested in making a particular point about Jesus (the "good news" for which they are named) rather than elaborating to their readers about where Jesus was from (they contradict themselves, and each other, on this point in a manner that makes it quite clear he was from Nazareth, almost certainly born there, and had no connection to Bethlehem whatsoever; our article does a pretty shitty job of pointing this out, by the way), what he did in his childhood and adolescence, what his views on various social issues not specifically related to the good news were (he seems to have abstained from marriage and encouraged his followers to do likewise, while also condemning divorce), and so on.
 * I am, however, curious why you think Bauckham's book is "highly influential" and "must be cited". I've been out of the loop on NT studies for a while, but my understanding was that fundamentalists and conservative evangelicals like Bauckham's book because it basically agrees with what they already believe, but scholars generally don't share his conclusions.
 * Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 22:14, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I won't comment your POV about the authors and their beliefs, it is of no interest on this talk page. It is enough to say that Wikipedia must reflect the current state of knowledge.
 * Since you know the field, I guess that you won't contest that Burridge's thesis is highly influential and cannot be overlooked.
 * Regarding Bauckham's Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, it is even more quoted than Burridge's thesis (cf. google scholar). Bauckham's book his indeed "highly influential", frequently described as such, for example here. A special issue of the leading peer-reviewed Journal for the Study of the Historical Jesus was devoted to the book in 2008. The burden of proof is on you. Thucyd (talk) 23:03, 11 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Not really, no; unless scholarly consensus on this topic has changed dramatically since Bauckham published his book, there is no requirement to cite this or that particular scholar, and Bauckham is hardly as influential as Sanders or Ehrman. It doesn't really matter how widely cited Bauckham is (among whom? do the citers agree or disagree with his conclusions?), and your citing an article that calls his book "influential" doesn't conflict with what I wrote above about fundamentalists and conservative evangelicals like Bauckham's book.
 * Anyway, is it your intention to hijack this thread with an unrelated issue about how you feel it needs to cite this or that author you happen to agree with? I made a specific request above and you ignored it to go off on a tangent about something that concerned you.
 * Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:52, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Ad hominem again (and unwarranted). The topic has changed dramatically since Burridge and Bauckham (who are Anglicans...) published their books. Many scholars have described them as a paradigm shift.
 * Burridge, well, it's obvious for everybody: "Few PhD theses can boast a paradigm shift within a field, but Burridge's ‘What Are the Gospels? A Comparison with Graeco‐Roman Biography’ could be numbered among the exceptions... He is right to believe that the Graeco‐Roman biographical designation has become a near consensus in Gospel Studies". (Louise Lawrence,     2010, here)
 * Bauckham: As I said, the burden of proof is on you: "Advanced scholarly praise for this book has created high expectation for readers and reviewers. Hailed as a “blockbuster” (J.D.G. Dunn) and a “tour de force” (N.T. Wright) that “shakes the foundations of a century of scholarly study of the Gospels” (G. Stanton) and promises to be “a pioneering work refuting old and new errors” (M. Hengel). Bauckham’s thorough study of eyewitness testimony to Jesus is a major event in New Testament studies... The heart of the book is a solid advance in the study of the Gospels with which all subsequent studies will have to reckon." (Peter Rodgers, Novum Testamentum, 52, 2010, 88-89). Thucyd (talk) 10:32, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * "ad hominem"? So, are you actually going to provide me with the quote from Sanders or not? Do you even have it? Why are you here? If you want to talk about Bauckham, open your own section. The topic has changed dramatically since Burridge and Bauckham (who are Anglicans...) published their books. I would argue that the topic only changed when you posted about something completely unrelated to what I wrote... Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 10:37, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * The quote from E.P. Sanders: "The main sources for our knowledge of Jesus himself, the gospels in the New Testament, are, from the point of view of the historian, tainted by the fact that they were written by people who intended to glorify their hero". Sanders says something obvious (every historical source is biased and tainted, like Platon and Socrates) and does not use the word "compromised". Thucyd (talk) 11:12, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, now that I've seen the quote I'm more convinced than before that it was an overly simplified statement from the book's introduction; it looks like such a statement. Your concern is completely unrelated, and as far as I am concerned it is a non-issue, since "tainted" is if anything just a stronger/more-inflammatory way of saying "compromised". Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 11:48, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

Gospels as biographies of Jesus
I don't see how this is a "paradigm shift" in scholarship: it's pretty much always been a widely held view among laymen that the gospels are biographies of Jesus. If Burridge shifted the scholarly paradigm to be more in line with this lay view back in 1992, then why would Dale Martin say in 2009 that the Popular opinion may think that the Gospels are biographies of Jesus, but they're not biographies, at least not anything like the modern sense. [...] The Gospels aren't biographies. [...] This all demonstrates though that scholars don't read the Gospels as biographies or as even straightforward accounts of events. Did the paradigm shift happen in the one year between then and when Louise Lawrence wrote the above-quoted text? Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 10:48, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * You miss the whole point. The Gospels are *Graeco-Roman* biographies, like those written by Plutarch (which are quite reliable for historians). Thucyd (talk) 11:01, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * The biographies of Plutarch are quite reliable for historians now? You mean that historians use those sources like they use the gospels, right, by critically analyzing them and taking from them factual details that seem credible and are not contradicted by other sources as having a high degree of probability of having actually happened? "reliable" is a buzzword used in Christian apologetics to mean something different from how historians (...might...?) use it. Your bias is showing, and not just because you are contradicting yourself in claiming that the scholarship quoted in the article is "out of date" despite being more recent than the "recent" scholarship you want to emphasize; the fact that historians use a particular text as a source of information doesn't mean it is "reliable". Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 11:45, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I am glad to see that you do realize that nowadays the vast majority of NT scholars think that the Gospels are Graeco-Roman biographies.
 * Additional quote, from Ehrman: "The Gospels of the NT are widely seen as examples of ancient biography" (here).
 * Another quote: "Burridge’s research has been widely accepted and has produced a new consensus, that the Gospels are a species of ancient biography" (Steve Walton, "What Are the Gospels? Richard Burridge’s Impact on Scholarly Understanding of the Genre of the Gospels", Currents in Biblical Research, 14, 1, 2015, p. 81,|here)
 * This consensus view must be included in the source section. Thucyd (talk) 12:50, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Stop it. You're taking quotes out of context: Ehrman explicitly says immediately after the portion you quote "So it would help to know how biographies worked in Greek and Roman antiquity." The whole point is that "ancient biography" means something different from "modern biography", but you are clearly trying to blur the line.
 * I can't make head or tail of what you mean by I am glad to see that you do realize that nowadays the vast majority of NT scholars think that the Gospels are Graeco-Roman biographies. Are you just trolling or something? Nothing I said above remotely resembled that, and nor did anything I wrote in my initial comment justify anything you've written since.
 * Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 12:56, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Ehrman says that the Gospels are widely seen nowadays as Graeco-Roman biographies.
 * That was exactly my point. Nothing more. The end for me. Thank you. Thucyd (talk) 14:24, 12 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Reminder: we have already a paragraph about this topic, with top reliable sources in the "canonical gospels" sub-section: "One important aspect of the study of the gospels is the literary genre under which they fall. Genre "is a key convention guiding both the composition and the interpretation of writings". Whether the gospel authors set out to write novels, myths, histories, or biographies has a tremendous impact on how they ought to be interpreted. Some recent studies suggest that the genre of the gospels ought to be situated within the realm of ancient biography. Although not without critics, the position that the gospels are a type of ancient biography is the consensus among scholars today." Thucyd (talk) 10:13, 13 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Okay, so ... what's the problem? Do you think the above is not neutral or detailed enough? I find the text you added to be worse than the above on both fronts, and I'm not arguing to change any of the above. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 02:03, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
 * The source section is now clearly misleading due to the fact that it does not mention ancient biographies. We can take the sentence from the canonical gospels sub-section, slightly rearranged: "Although not without critics, the position that the gospels are a type of ancient biography, *not biographies in the modern sense*, is the consensus among scholars today". Can we agree on this?Thucyd (talk) 08:09, 14 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm not seeing the problem. The fact that the authors thought they were writing a form of literary work common in the Greco-Roman world does not make them more or less useful as sources for information on Jesus's biography; can you find a modern scholarly source that specifically says the canonical gospels are awesome sources because they are "ancient biographies"? Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 06:36, 16 December 2018 (UTC)
 * This causal relationship ("awesome sources because") was never the point. The fact that the Gospels are ancient biographies is of course primordial for historical and hermeneutical reasons, especially to understand some features of the sources (cf. for example Michael Licona, Why are there Contradictions in the Gospels: What we Can Learn from Ancient Biographies, Oxford University Press, 2016).
 * We simply have to mention the fact that the Gospels are ancient biographies, because that's what wikipedia is all about: inform the reader of what the academic consensus is. And there is no doubt that we have an academic consensus here. Thucyd (talk) 13:05, 16 December 2018 (UTC)
 * But we already do mention that they are ancient biographies. The question of why you want to emphasize it more than it already is, specifically in the section discussing the problematic nature of the primary sources (a point on which all the best scholars agree with what we currently say), is being posed, not the question of whether the gospels are ancient biographies. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 03:47, 18 December 2018 (UTC)
 * We say in the source section what they are not (modern biographies), but you do want to say what they are (ancient biographies). It's very misleading and we must correct that.
 * Now that you realize that our sources are, according to the consensus, ancient biographies, and that the nature of thoses sources is, according to the consensus, primordial for historical and hermeneutical reasons (cf. all the references above), you have no argument against this improvement.
 * Given the fact that you are higly interested in this topic, you should read Burridge. The 25th anniversary edition has just been published. Thucyd (talk) 07:50, 18 December 2018 (UTC)
 * It's very misleading and we must correct that. How is it misleading? In my opinion it would be misleading to describe them as "ancient biographies" in a manner that implied they were anything like modern biographies.
 * you have no argument against this improvement Martin's lectures are the best sources presented in this discussion thusfar, and he essentially says "They're not modern biographies; they'r kinda like ancient biographies; ancient biographies are not especially useful for understanding the lives of their subjects". You have not addressed this concern.
 * Given the fact that you are higly interested in this topic, you should read Burridge. I live in Japan, and so would need to privately import the book, and doing so without a credit card (I've been working as a contract employee for years, so the two times I applied for a credit card it was a waste of time) is complicated. Show me where I can download an e-book and the price will be added to my phone bill, then maybe. But it would only be an interesting read, and would not change my opinion on this matter.
 * Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 08:07, 18 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Dale Martin's remarks are clearly not the best sources!!!... They are not even peer-reviewed, contrary to all the articles and books I quoted.
 * The burden of proof is on you. Due to the fact that you do not have access to recent academic publications, you should reconsider your position.
 * If you do not quote here recent peer-reviewed articles or books, I will make the needed changes.Thucyd (talk) 15:07, 18 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Dale Martin's remarks are clearly not the best sources!!!... They are not even peer-reviewed, contrary to all the articles and books I quoted. You clearly do not know how to properly assess sources for our purposes. When two sources both say the same thing, but one says it in a manner that more resembles an article in a general encyclopedia and the other is a book on the subject that clearly says a lot more than we need to (or, rather, anything it says that we quote it on would be taken out of context and distorted), then the former is the better source. On top of that, referring to open courses on the official YouTube channel of Yale University as "remarks [that] are not even peer-reviewed" appears to indicate that you either do not understand the sources or are deliberately misrepresenting them as being somehow "less" than they actually are. The burden of proof is on you. Due to the fact that you do not have access to recent academic publications, you should reconsider your position. What on earth are you talking about? I have all Bart Ehrman's recent books, but I'm not interested in throwing money away to appease someone who is trolling me on a Wikipedia talk page. What buying this or that book would do to ameliorate this problem is something you need to demonstrate. If you do not quote here recent peer-reviewed articles or books, I will make the needed changes. If you do not engage in constructive discussion on the talk page, then all your edits need to be reverted as counter-productive edit-warring. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 15:18, 18 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Gentle reminder: a peer-reviewed source is not a lecture given in an university nor a popular book.
 * For example, Bart Ehrman's Misquoting Jesus is a popular title, not an academic work.
 * Let me give you an example, since you appreciate Bart: "Bart Ehrman’s widely-used introduction to the New Testament states in 1997: ‘Scholars have come to reject the view that [the Gospels] are totally unlike anything else…some of these investigations have suggested that the Gospels are best seen as a kind of Greco-Roman (as opposed to modern) biography’ (Ehrman 1997:52). Burridge’s influence is clear, for Ehrman cites What are the Gospels? as ‘[a] thorough study that emphatically argues that the Gospels are best understood as a kind of ancient biography’ (Ehrman 1997:55)" (from Steve Walton, "What Are the Gospels? Richard Burridge's Impact on Scholarly Understanding of the Genre of the Gospels", Currents in Biblical Research, 2015, accessible here)
 * Still waiting for your peer-reviewed sources. Thucyd (talk) 16:52, 18 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't need "peer-reviewed sources", since your peer-reviewed sources don't actually contradict my "popular sources"; you just want to to quote them out of context to draw a conclusion that they don't. Stop trolling and go build the encyclopedia. I have no idea why you brought up Misquoting Jesus, which is ironically one of the few books Ehrman has written in the last two decades which I haven't read; it would seem Ehrman and Misquoting Jesus are hot-button topics for you, I guess? Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 00:08, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Lol. No problem at all with Bart, believe me. He agrees with me on Burridge and, contrary to you, he admits the fact that knowing the genre of those sources is primordial for historical and hermeneutical reasons. Thucyd (talk) 18:47, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * contrary to you, he admits the fact that knowing the genre of those sources is primordial for historical and hermeneutical reasons HA! There's a world of difference between saying that "it is important to know the genre" and saying that "I know the genre, and that genre makes these sources reliable for historical purposes". Ehrman, like virtually all non-fundamentalist scholars, recognizes that the gospels, as ancient-as-opposed-to-modern biographies, are highly problematic as sources for the historical Jesus. As for being "primordial for hermeneutical reasons", that is completely beside the point, and your suddenly bringing it up well over a week into this discussion just comes across as more trolling. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 23:52, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I would be suddendly bringing up "primordial for hermeneutical reasons"? lol. That was already my sentence on December 16, then 18 December, and finally 19 December!!! For your information, there are pages on this in Burridge's seminal book.
 * Your own distinction between fundamentalists (meaning???) and others is also beyond ridiculous.
 * Those two elements, and your inability to provide peer-reviewed sources, show beyond reasonable doubt that your are not really interested in our discussion and in the current state of scholarship, but in safekeeping your ideology and prejudice. Thucyd (talk) 08:39, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Please retract the above off-topic personal attack, and stay on topic. This is the talk page for our biographical article on Jesus, not a forum for you to talk generally about interpretation of the NT texts. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 09:31, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

" *Graeco-Roman* biographies, like those written by Plutarch (which are quite reliable for historians)."

Plutarch as a biographer was mostly interested in exploring the moral virtues and vices of his subjects, rather than giving a full account of their lives: "As is explained in the opening paragraph of his Life of Alexander, Plutarch was not concerned with history so much as the influence of character, good or bad, on the lives and destinies of men. Whereas sometimes he barely touched on epoch-making events, he devoted much space to charming anecdote and incidental triviality, reasoning that this often said far more for his subjects than even their most famous accomplishments. He sought to provide rounded portraits, likening his craft to that of a painter" Dimadick (talk) 19:33, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Thank you, but the (side) point is of course "quite reliable for historians". All new testement scholars are now well aware that there are different approaches between modern and ancient historians, modern and ancient biographies. Thucyd (talk) 23:59, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Ah, okay. So when you say the gospels are reliable for historians, you mean ancient historians. Good. So now that we've established that you are trying to insert obscure/misleading terminology into the article, can we drop this whole affair? Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 00:03, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
 * 1)No, I meant "quite reliable" for modern historians.
 * 2)In my edits in the main page, I never talked of reliability. This fuzzy word is your obsession, not mine. That's why I say it's a side point. I just want to repeat in the main page that the Gospels are ancient biographies.
 * 3)If you are interested in this current debate (how, when and why modern historians can assess the reliability of ancient sources) you should read the in-depth dialogue between Bart Ehrman and Mike Licona on the historical reliability of the New Testament. It's online for free, so you have no excuse this time. Thucyd (talk) 08:39, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 6 January 2019
Factual error correction request: Please replace "Jesus" with "Joseph" in the following three sentences of the "Genealogy of Jesus and Nativity of Jesus" section: "The Gospels of Matthew and Luke offer two accounts of the genealogy of Jesus. Matthew traces Jesus' ancestry to Abraham through David (1:1–16).[108] Luke traces Jesus' ancestry through Adam to God (3:23–38).[109]" — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.51.157.191 (talk) 21:49, 6 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Not done You don't trump WP:RS. Tgeorgescu (talk) 07:28, 7 January 2019 (UTC)

The ancestry of Joseph, not Jesus, is what is directly listed in the references named in these sentences (Matthew 1:1-16 and Luke 3:23-38). These references can be read here: https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Luke-3-23_3-31// and https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Matthew-1-1_1-16//. Third-hand sources are inappropriate in this case. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.51.157.191 (talk) 02:26, 8 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Both verses present the ancestry of Jesus, beginning (Luke)/ending (Matthew) by stating that Jesus is the son of Joseph. Read them again.  General Ization Talk  02:35, 8 January 2019 (UTC)

If you claim the Bible states something, you must either directly quote it or paraphrase the information precisely, which is not being done in the entry. The Bible verse quoted is explicit upfront that Jesus is not a biological descendant of this line (Luke 3:23 explains that the genealogy given is because Jesus "was supposed the son of Joseph"). By omitting Joseph, these statements are inconsistent with modern English usage of the term "ancestry" and give the deceptive impression that the Bible states that Jesus is a biological descendant of David. Jesus' claim to the house of David is an important topic in Christianity, and Wikipedia should be in the business of clarity. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.51.157.191 (talk) 16:08, 8 January 2019 (UTC)

As I am moving on this dispute, I need to be even more direct: Your statement that these Bible references begin/end "by stating that Jesus is the son of Joseph" is incorrect by a plain reading of the references. (Also, such a statement would obviously up-end Christian theology).74.51.157.191 (talk) 04:55, 9 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Read the New Testament in Greek, and a good portion of the problem goes away. See also Romans 1:3 and Joachim or  https://christianity.stackexchange.com/a/61413. In any case, this type of thing has been discussed for literally thousands of years. I'm quite sure a notable book has been written discussing this. Find it and then perhaps we can use it to write a sentence disputing the claim. Your own research/analysis is not going to cut it.  ResultingConstant (talk) 17:21, 8 January 2019 (UTC)
 * My aim is not to engage conspiracy theories. The plain language in the referenced Bible passages state the lineage from Joseph, not Mary. If there are scholars who dispute the authority of the Authorized King James Bible in Christianity or who believe a lack of a definite article in Greek proves a reference to Mary, they can open up a separate edit request.74.51.157.191 (talk) 04:55, 9 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. &#8209;&#8209; El Hef  ( Meep? ) 17:33, 8 January 2019 (UTC)

I'm not sure exactly what is being argued here. My wife and I are adopting a child. His DNA comes from his birth parents and if you trace his DNA lineage, you would trace it back through his birth mother and father, to their parents, etc. Once the adoption is complete, his legal lineage will come from me and my wife - when you adopt a child, they are every bit as much legally your heir, with equal standing to any natural children you may have. So the Bible traces Jesus's legal lineage through His adoptive father (Joseph) and His DNA lineage through Mary. --B (talk) 12:41, 9 January 2019 (UTC)
 * First off, wow, a single letter username! In any case, this is important for religious reasons, as the prophecies of the Messiah say that he will be "of the flesh" of David. So Joseph's lineage doesn't really count for that purpose, and a "straight/naive" reading of the bible only lists Joseph's lineage. The traditional (catholic/orthodox) answer is that Mary is also of David's line, but that requires relying on either extra-biblical sources, or parsing through euphamism/translation to have the second Joseph bible lineage really be Mary's lineage as described in my link above. The various textual difficulties and traditions are complex, and this line of argument is brought up often by various groups (Jewish groups arguing that Jesus is obviously not the Messiah, Athiests trying to say its obvious made-up contradictory BS, various offshoot Christian movements, etc) ResultingConstant (talk) 16:16, 9 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Collapsed per WP:TPO and WP:NOTFORUM. Mathglot (talk) 07:50, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

rfc on Jesus' ancestry
RFC Do these Matthew and Luke verses give the ancestry of Mary or of Joseph? If Joseph, should Wikipedia entries regarding ancestry claims be clarified when the topic individual (Jesus) is not the biological descendant of the claimed ancestor (David), or if the verses contradict/do not support the claim of biological descent? 04:31, 10 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Comment: the verses explicitly state that they are giving the genealogy of Jesus, tracing his ancestry through Joseph to various figures of symbolic importance in Jewish tradition. Elsewhere Jesus is described as "the son of Joseph".  There are different ways to reconcile this with the theological claim that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and that Joseph did not have relations with Mary before the birth of Jesus.  One interpretation would be that the Evangelists did not view these positions as contradictory; a more skeptical view would be that they were unable to resolve the conflict and so ignored it.  It doesn't really matter which you prefer, because in the end that's what the Gospels say.  And they're the main sources for the accounts of Jesus' life.  He's mentioned by other sources, but apart from religious ones, few of them provide much detail.  And the non-religious sources certainly don't make any claims about him being the son of God, in some sense other than the general observation that all men are sons of God.  Ultimately whether Joseph is treated as the father of Jesus is a theological question that can't be resolved simply by resorting to the plain language of scripture.  The Gospels clearly treat him as though he were, even though they also provide support for the contrary opinion.  It's not Wikipedia's job to unravel theological knots, although of course you can report what scholarly literature has to say on the subject.  P Aculeius (talk) 23:43, 10 January 2019 (UTC)
 * These verses do not use the word "ancestry." That word was used by the Wikipedia entry author. Only Matthew 1:1 (King James Version) uses the word "genealogy," but it then proceeds to define the word as "Lit. generation." It is informing the reader that the passage will explain the generation of Jesus. The passage closes with the virgin pregnancy, Joseph taking Mary as wife, the virgin birth, and the naming. In other words, using this single word to imply that a biological line of Jesus is given is highly misleading, since a different definition is explicitly used by the Bible. Even if the Bible hadn't bothered to define the word, it is still misleading to write an entry that implies a biological line of descent to Jesus when the passage clearly gives the opposite to be the case. So we are back to: There is nothing in either of these passages supporting a biological descent of Jesus from David, and the current entry is misleading by not stating that it is actually Joseph's line when the source material gives Joseph's line. Please recheck the Matthew and Luke wording and report back. If you do not contradict, it will be taken as agreement. To your other points, Jesus's legal status vis-a-vis Joseph is not in dispute, only the claim of biological descent from David from these passages. 74.51.157.191 (talk) 04:22, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I'd say that the distinction you're trying to draw is artificial. "Biological descent" is a scientific term that's only recently been added to our lexicon, and has no particular connection to the Gospels or other scriptural material.  The source material describes the generations or genealogy (your interpretation of "literal" is dubious, because most words have multiple applications, particularly in languages other than English, where there aren't as many alternatives to provide subtly different meanings; you say that the word doesn't mean "genealogy" in the original, but what alternatives would have been used in the original text at the time it was written if that meaning were intended by the author?  Even if other words were theoretically available, what words are used by contemporary writers in the same language to describe the two concepts, and were they clearly distinguished, or blended together?  I see no evidence that this has been investigated) to or from Jesus.
 * Resorting to the text, Matthew begins with (KJV): "The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham." Not "The book of the generation of Joseph".  The second and third clauses further reinforce that Jesus is being called the son of Joseph, not "the son of the Holy Spirit, which is one with God, and he had no other ancestors in the male line".  After all, if Jesus wasn't considered the son of Joseph, then it wouldn't make sense to describe him as the son of David, and the son of Abraham.  You could argue over whether Mary's descent could justify this, but since it isn't presented in this chapter, that clearly isn't the author's intent.  More modern translations give "genealogy" rather than "generation(s)", implying that "genealogy" is closer to the original intent, at least in modern English, which is the opposite of your contention.  The Gospel of Luke says, "And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli".  This passage clearly calls Jesus the son of Joseph; the parenthetical, "as was supposed" does not mean, "but was not"; in plain English it means "yes it was".  And it's pretty much the same in every translation.  There's no ambiguity.  The Gospel of John also refers to Jesus as "the son of Joseph" multiple times.
 * So what we come back to is that you're trying to force a distinction that none of the Evangelists made, and which seems to be textually contradicted by three of the four main Gospels. You're relying on terminology that didn't exist until modern times, and wading into a theological discussion that can't be resolved simply by resorting to the relevant scriptural passages.  The only other sources that might explicitly state Jesus' descent, i.e. non-religious ones, would tend to assume that Joseph was his father, whatever else might have been said of him.  So I'm not seeing any evidence to support your argument.  P Aculeius (talk) 14:21, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * The important concession on your part is that these references do not give a descent of Mary from David. The gist of your argument is one or all of the following: 1) there is no difference between biological paternity and legal paternity, or at least 2) the ancients did not know the difference, or that 3) “supposed” the son is equivalent to “is” the son. The second point encompasses the first, and it is too absurd to be debated. The ancients did understand the concept of bloodlines and illegitimate births. Ironically, the very passage in question disproves you; Matthew 1:19 shows Joseph understood siring. In the New Testament, we find Jews questioning whether Jesus is descended from David. My distinction between blood and legal descent is supported, not contradicted, by these and other Bible passages. As for your third argument, if the ancients did know the difference between blood and legal lines and therefore the New Testament authors made it a point to state that Jesus is considered (“supposed”) “the son of Joseph” after stating he did not father the child, which I acknowledge they do, then Wikipedia should also make this distinction in the entry. You don’t want to misrepresent the concepts in the Bible, do you?74.51.157.191 (talk) 03:47, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Also, as a minor point of order, “γενεσεως” and “generationis” were the words used in all Greek and Latin Bibles, respectively, both of which mean “generation.” The word for genealogy or pedigree in these languages is different. The 21st Century King James Version even fixes it back to “generation,” as does the Douay-Rheims, the Catholic counterpart to KJV.74.51.157.191 (talk) 03:59, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry, but you've misunderstood substantially everything I said. I'm not arguing that there was no distinction between biological and legal paternity; I'm saying that you're forcing modern terminology, with all its cultural baggage, on what is, in essence, myth (in the technical sense, not implying anything about the truth of the story).  It's perfectly reasonable to infer from the plain language of the Evangelists that they considered Jesus to be the son of Joseph, even though he was conceived through the Holy Spirit before Joseph "knew" his wife.  They simply chose not to make the distinction you're choosing to make, either because they did not think it essential to do so, or because they could not unravel the theological knot created by the apparent inconsistency—perhaps both.  That says nothing about the ancients being too stupid to understand the concept of illegitimacy.  The word "supposed" here is relevant because it seems to have been taken out of context to support your argument.  If the text read, "the supposed son of Joseph" or "whom they supposed to be the son of Joseph", then it would support your argument.  But it says, "being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph", which means that not only was he "supposed" to be the son of Joseph, but that he in fact was the son of Joseph, notwithstanding the circumstances of his conception.
 * You could argue endlessly on why this was so (could the Holy Spirit have used a sample of Joseph's DNA? Was it simply a miracle?), but those details were irrelevant to the Evangelists, who simply describe him as the son of Joseph, and provide a genealogy (and to be honest, whether you use this word or "generations" doesn't appear to be relevant either; the meaning in this context is the same) that assumes that Jesus is the son of Joseph.  I simply don't see any grounds for making the distinction you want to make.  I'm not saying that it's not a valid point of theological inquiry; merely that it's not a matter you can resolve through the text of the scriptures, and that as stated it comes down to your personal interpretation, rather than a reporting of scholarly investigation and discussion.  If you can find scholarly writings that discuss this particular issue, feel free to add them to the article in the appropriate places.  But at this point you're simply trying to modify the article based on your understanding, rather than what the sources themselves say.  P Aculeius (talk) 14:28, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * This is argument 3) but more wordy. Per the passages cited, Jesus is not of the bloodline of Joseph, and Mary also is not of the bloodline of David. There is consensus on this by everyone in this talk section. This Wikipedia entry gives the opposite. Whether you see any grounds for making the distinction between blood and law in this context is irrelevant as the authors of the New Testament themselves made the distinction in the very passage cited, the Jews questioned it in subsequent New Testament passages (your dismissal of their status borders on anti-Semitic), and you are not the only audience for Wikipedia entries. Wikipedia entries should not be misleading to a global audience. Also, your interpretation of the word "supposed" is WP:OR, and the word "generation" was singular not plural; the burden of proof is on you to establish that it means the same thing as the modern English word "genealogy" in any context. 74.51.157.191 (talk) 21:52, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I think this debate has passed the point at which it serves any purpose. You're ignoring what I actually said, and arguing that the language of the scriptures means the opposite of what it says.  Explaining why the plain language doesn't support your argument isn't original research, but your proposed changes to the article based on your interpretation of scripture would be.  I never said that Mary's descent isn't set forth in the New Testament; I made no assertion about it, other than that it isn't given in the passages at issue, and therefore the assertion that Jesus was "the son of David" and "the son of Abraham" must depend on his being the son of Joseph in these passages.  You can argue about "biological descent" and "bloodlines" until the cows come home, but that's not based on the text of the Gospels, which fail to make any such distinction, and certainly don't use that terminology.  I don't have any burden of proving to you that two words used to translate the same word mean the same thing in that context.  The burden is on you to show that the scriptures say exactly what you're alleging they do—not merely that you could interpret them that way, since that would be original research unless cited to an independent source.  You also might want to avoid using the phrase "disruptive personal attacks" to avoid the core issues in this debate, particularly after alleging that the arguments set forth by one of the editors who disagrees with your interpretation "borders on anti-Semitic".  That takes real chutzpah!  But I think I've said all I need to in this discussion, and think I'll sit back and let the rest resolve itself.  P Aculeius (talk) 22:13, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * If I am not allowed to introduce the word "bloodline" because the New Testament does not, then by the same logic, the Wikipedia entry author is not allowed to introduce the word "ancestry" because the New Testament does not. ("The Gospels of Matthew and Luke offer two accounts of the genealogy of Jesus. Matthew traces Jesus' ancestry to Abraham through David (1:1–16).[108] Luke traces Jesus' ancestry through Adam to God (3:23–38).[109]"). Bottom line is these intro sentences are misleading. At a bare minimum, "from Joseph, husband of Mary" (to distinguish from the other Josephs in the line) should be added in front of "to Abraham" and "through Adam," in sentences 2 and 3, respectively. Why oppose that? 74.51.157.191 (talk) 23:11, 12 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia should state what reliable unbiased sources state. An encyclopedia is not a venue for editors' speculation or for individual editors' personal exegesis of Biblical texts. Softlavender (talk) 05:51, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * At dispute here is whether the Wikipedia entry is an accurate write-up of the passages cited. The passages give that Jesus is not of the bloodline of Joseph, and no line of descent from David to Mary is given in the New Testament. There has been and is no dispute on these points. We are all in agreement as to these facts. Therefore, the Wikipedia entry should be corrected because it is misleading, and the burden of proof is on my interlocuters to prove why it should not be corrected. So far, no one has offered any reasoning as to why it should not be corrected, other than the claim by the guy above that he and, by his WP:OR inference, the 12 Evangelists, do not care about it. 74.51.157.191 (talk) 21:52, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * "12 Evangelists"?. I thought there were only four.Smeat75 (talk) 22:10, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * So even fewer people potentially agree with him then. 74.51.157.191 (talk) 23:11, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * It's really hard to take you seriously when you invent something like "12 Evangelists", attributing it to someone who said nothing of the kind, then treat it as proof of your argument when somebody questions it. P Aculeius (talk) 16:19, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * You are not required to take anyone seriously. You are required to respond or to yield to the proof that was just presented. 74.51.157.191 (talk) 17:12, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
 * We should not be performing our own primary-source write-up of any remotely-controversial biblical passage, fullstop. We should rely on secondary sources - that is, we should cite scholars, religious leaders, or other reliable sources, and cover what they say, impartially documenting all noteworthy disagreements to the extent that the people involved pass WP:DUE and aren't WP:FRINGE. Rather than performing your own analysis of the Bible (or demanding that people here do the same), you should search for high-quality analysis from reputable sources and use those. --Aquillion (talk) 05:01, 8 February 2019 (UTC)


 * What P Aculeius and Softlavender said. WP is not a Sunday school lesson.Smeat75 (talk) 15:23, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * You have not contributed any rationale or arguments in this comment. Therefore we must assume that you agree that the sources give that Jesus is not of the bloodline of Joseph and that no line of descent from David to Mary is given in the New Testament. The question is what to do about the entry wording, given that the entry is misleading to Wikipedia's non-Christian and Christian modern English-speaking audience. 74.51.157.191 (talk) 21:52, 12 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Agreeing with P Aculeius, Softlavender and Smeat75. The IP fails to understand how WP works, and seems unable to WP:HEAR what others say. This is ever so slightly moving towards disruptive territory, and it has long since crossed in WP:OR. We report what scholarly sources say, period. Jeppiz (talk) 17:10, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * These are disruptive personal attacks; please stick to rationale or arguments. No original research is being requested to be entered, only a correction, the factual correctness of which all in this section are in agreement with. We will assume you are in agreement with the factual correctness of it too since you did not dispute it in your comment. We are now up to four people, at least three of whom are opponents, who agree that the sources give that Jesus is not of the bloodline of Joseph and there is no line of descent from David to Mary. Please elaborate on why Wikipedia should not correct the entry. 74.51.157.191 (talk) 21:52, 12 January 2019 (UTC)


 * The IP also fails know how to create a workable RfC. The RfC cites sources and then fails to link to, quote, or specify the text of the sources, yet it then asks the readers to speculate on said sources, under the unproven assumption and presumption that such decisions or speculations are relevant to this Wikipedia article. Softlavender (talk) 23:04, 14 January 2019 (UTC)

The official Catechism of the Catholic Church gives that Jesus is not of the bloodline but of the "messianic lineage" of David.
 * God called Joseph to "take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit," so that Jesus, "who is called Christ," should be born of Joseph's spouse into the messianic lineage of David.34 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.51.157.191 (talk) 22:29, 12 January 2019 (UTC)


 * I am not seeing a proposed edit here, but think one is not warranted anyway. The article section on Genealogy and nativity is clear from the start that the two books have differences, and gives highlights from both.  That seems like DUE covering in line with WEIGHT of coverage.  Puzzling over the question of this thread is loosely interesting but seems moot as not a common enough topic to be DUE a mention, much less trying to find and show all significant positions.   Cheers Markbassett (talk) 14:52, 14 January 2019 (UTC)


 * "The passages give that Jesus is not of the bloodline of Joseph" Joseph as a character, appears only in the Gospels of Luke and Matthew. There is a single, brief reference to him in the Gospel of John (which has no nativity narrative), and no reference at all in the Gospel of Mark (which starts with an adult Jesus). The myth of the Virgin birth of Jesus is absent in the gospels of both Mark and John. The narrative which insists on the virgin birth is Matthew's, while Luke's narrative is more vague on the topic. As noted in our article:


 * The Book of Luke differs from Matthew in depicting a virginal conception rather than a virgin birth (there is nothing in Luke that suggests Joseph did not have sexual relations with Mary after the angelic visit). ... Luke's virgin birth story is a standard plot from the Jewish scriptures, as for example in the annunciation scenes for Isaac and for Samson, in which an angel appears and causes apprehension, the angel gives reassurance and announces the coming birth, the mother raises an objection, and the angel gives a sign."
 * "The fact that the virgin birth is mentioned only by Matthew and Luke is considered to produce doubt as to its truth by scholars such as Jürgen Moltmann. He writes: "In the New Testament, Christ's 'virgin birth' is related only by Luke and Matthew. It was unknown, or considered unimportant, in wide areas of early Christian belief (the Pauline and Johannine sectors, for example). But from the third century onwards it became a firm component of the Christian creeds and theological christologies." He also writes: "The virgin birth is not one of the pillars that sustains the New Testament faith in Christ. The confession of faith in Jesus, the Son of God, the Lord, is independent of the virgin birth, and is not based on it." "Moreover, we find the confession of faith in Christ in Christian traditions which know nothing of the virgin birth, or do not mention it." He concludes: "that the virgin birth does not provide the justification for confessing Christ." Dimadick (talk) 15:05, 14 January 2019 (UTC)

Jesus had 2 parents, four grandparents, 8 great-gp, and so on. Matthew lists 40 generations of them from Abraham, which means that by the time we get to Perez the father of Hezron he has 68,719,476,736 (68.7 billion) ancestors all alive at the same time. That's quite a lot.PiCo (talk) 06:27, 18 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Well, that sounds impossible, but of course when you think about it, everyone living today has had around 40 generations of ancestors just since the year 800. And there certainly weren't 68 billion people living then!  This is an example of a phenomenon known to genealogists as "pedigree collapse", whereby if you can trace your lineage far enough back, you'll see the same names appearing over and over again in different branches.  That's because for most of human history, people lived in the same relatively small communities for generations, and became related to almost everyone around them, making it rare to marry someone they weren't at least distantly related to.  Even if someone moved to a new area, within a few generations they'd be related to most of the people there.  Geneticists tell us that if we go back a few tens or perhaps hundreds of thousands of years, the whole human population consisted of at most a few tens of thousands of people, and that everyone living then, who has living descendants today, is almost certainly the ancestor of every person now living.  It doesn't take a miracle for Jesus to have had 40 generations of ancestors.  It would be a miracle if he hadn't!  P Aculeius (talk) 15:09, 18 January 2019 (UTC)


 * The bible places the birth of Abraham at roughly 2000 BC (1946 AM actually); with 40 generations to Jesus, this allows "generations" of 100 years - women are having babies at age 100 on average, some older, like Sarah, some considerably younger, like Mary, who was 13. Even allowing a lot of teenage pregnancies, seems a little improbable.PiCo (talk) 21:32, 18 January 2019 (UTC)


 * The Bible doesn't use an absolute chronography; it merely reports the generations and occasionally peppers its pages with commentary on the length that various persons lived or reigned. Until modern times there was no systematic attempt to harmonize these with actual history; we have Archbishop Ussher to thank for that.  But using your date, your arithmetic is off.  If Abraham was born in 1946 BC, and Jesus in 4 BC, then the span of time covered, 1,942 years, divided by forty generations from Abraham, equals 48.5 years per generation, not 100 years.  This would still be quite high by today's standards, but it's not impossible by any means; it says nothing about the age at which the mothers of each generation gave birth, and we might reasonably suppose that on the whole they were several years younger than their husbands, although there's no reason to assume that they were all teenagers; they could have been any age.  Note however that, according to Genesis, Abraham was one hundred years old when he begat Isaac, which alone brings the average generation down a little.  Perhaps more importantly, Luke gives fifty-five generations from Abraham to Jesus, which, after you account for Isaac being born about 1842 BC in your reckoning, gives an average generation of 33.5 years, somewhat reasonable even by today's standards.  And again, it says nothing about how old the wives were when they gave birth.  I'm not claiming that either of these lists are accurate or reflective of genealogical fact.  Merely that there's nothing inherently impossible about them, whichever route you follow. P Aculeius (talk) 14:05, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Apologies for the wonky maths - never was my strong point. For time-reckoning in the Old Testament, see the article Biblical chronology. But the real point I'm making (or rather operating from - I'm not really making any points) is that the Old Testament isn't real history. There never was an Adam or an Abraham, the regnal periods of the kings in 1 Kings are made up, and Matthew's 40 generations (made up of 3 units of 14, which is another piece of numerology) represents a cosmological history.Discussions like this are just silly.PiCo (talk) 23:25, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
 * They're anything but silly; myth isn't about detailing minute facts, but explaining larger truths about the universe. Understanding how myth develops from a combination of oral tradition and symbolism is an academic tradition of venerable lineage.  The Greeks discussed such ideas at great length, long before the birth of Jesus.  And I don't believe that anybody here has been arguing that the Old Testament needs to be treated as "history" in the modern sense.  However, it would be a mistake to dismiss the accounts of events contained therein as purely mythical occurrences without a factual basis.  While certain traditions bear the hallmarks of myth, and have no obvious connection to known persons and places, others appear to relate to individuals or events that are known from independent sources.  While the traditions relating to Adam have obvious mythological significance, and little connection to "history", those relating to Abraham seem to dimly recall actual events, places, and persons known from multiple sources, and they do not seem to represent a constructed myth, but rather a collection of stories relating to an actual figure, or possibly multiple figures that have become assimilated.  All of the details are up for debate, of course, but I think there's a reasonable scholarly consensus that there's some factual basis for some of the traditions relating to Abraham, including his probable existence.  Simply because certain details, such as a number of generations or a line of descent, serve a clear mythological purpose, doesn't mean that they were simply made up by the author; more often existing knowledge or traditions are edited to suit the purpose of the storyteller.  But that doesn't make them fictional, or unimportant.  This discussion was a request for comment on the genealogies: specifically whether they're contained in the scriptures, and whether they should be included in the article if they're "false".  They are clearly given in the scriptures.  But as many editors have pointed out, it's not our place as editors to determine whether the scriptures are true or false, as if that were even within our power.  We report what is said, and can qualify that by saying that it was said, and by whom, and what other scholars have said about that.  But we do not editorialize on the contents of either the scriptures or the scholars who discuss them.  Ultimately the reader decides what essential truths can be gleaned from the facts we report: not the fact of Jesus' descent, but the fact that the scriptures give it, in multiple versions.  P Aculeius (talk) 04:05, 20 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Comment there's a theological dispute here, but I'm not sure what the editorial one is. Matthew 1:1-16 and Luke 3:23-38 both clearly refer to the ancestry of Joseph.  Excessive details about this should be in Genealogy of Jesus. power~enwiki ( π,  ν ) 19:11, 24 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Pretty sure the person requesting comment outlined the issues. That editor's contention was that the article shouldn't refer to the ancestry of Jesus, because the two passages in question refer to the ancestry of Joseph, not of Jesus, since Joseph wasn't Jesus' father.  The problem with this is that both passages explicitly state that they're giving the ancestry of Jesus, not just Joseph, and Joseph is identified as Jesus' father, notwithstanding the proposer's contention that since Joseph hadn't "known" Mary before the birth of Jesus, he couldn't be his father.  Does this apparent contradiction pose a theological quandary?  Of course.  But the sources still say what they say, and the article shouldn't be rewritten in order to exclude the genealogies based on an editor's personal interpretation of the Gospels, and opinion of Jesus' paternity.  That's not how Wikipedia works.  P Aculeius (talk) 02:58, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Now I see the problem. You actually believe that the Bible is ambiguous whether Joseph could have fathered Jesus and that the Bible states that Joseph is Jesus's father. You view it like an amusing Hollywood story where a woman got pregnant and everything is implied, and the virgin birth is a face-saving device invented by Christians and has no direct textual basis. This is fantasy. The Bible specifically states that Joseph did not know Mary before the conception of Jesus in one of the very passages we have been arguing over: Matthew 1:18; also in Luke 1:34 in case there is any doubt. Please read these. The two passages do NOT state that they are giving the ancestry of Jesus, and Joseph is NOT identified as Jesus' father. Nowhere in the Bible does it claim that Joseph is Jesus' father. The virgin birth is not a theological quandary in Christianity. The quandary was explaining how Jesus could be the Messiah since He was not begat by Joseph and therefore not in the line of David. This isn't my personal issue. It is a real thing in Christianity that the Church had to develop a response for. I posted it above; please read it. I will be proposing a revision to the paragraph that should satisfy all parties, unless your aim is to mislead people into thinking that Christianity and the Bible hold that Joseph is Jesus's actual father.74.51.157.191 (talk) 03:10, 30 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Use secondary sources. The Bible is a primary source for matters of Christian faith; given how controversial it can be between denominations, we cannot perform any meaningful interpretation of it ourselves.  The appropriate thing to do in a case like this is to find secondary sources and cite them (and if there's disagreement, describe which groups think what, for the ones that pass WP:DUE and aren't WP:FRINGE.)  Wikipedia is not the place to perform your own Biblical exegesis. --Aquillion (talk) 05:01, 8 February 2019 (UTC)