Talk:Unitarianism/Archive 4

Disambiguating UU Unitarian theology from traditional Christian Unitarian theology
''This was posted to my personal talk page as a continuation of the above discussion; I have copied it exactly. Since this is a discussion for editing this article, I would rather it remain part of this article's talk history. TechBear &#124; Talk &#124; Contributions 15:42, 21 April 2015 (UTC)''

TechBear,

Unless you can explain to me how the disambiguation I placed in the lead of Unitarianism was "confusing" Christian Unitarian theology with UU Unitarian theology, I will be wanting to place an Rfc on this question. To me your logic still seems confusing. Granted, UU Unitarian theology is different from Christian Unitarian theology, but I cannot understand why you do not want to describe the stark differences in the article's lead, in order to assist those who read the article for the first time, to let them know what they are truly reading about. Merely essentially stating in the lead your obvious personal opinion that Unitarianism = Christian Unitarian Theology, and then implying (but not stating) that UU Unitarians have no theology, seems to me to be quite confusing. I apologize, but unless you could somehow "unconfuse me" about this within the next two days (by Thursday morning), I feel I will have no choice but to call an Rfc to the question. In such an Rfc, I would be additionally be advocating for two more things: I would also be placing a notice regarding this discussion at the UU article page, as any decisions about the Unitarianism article itself would obviously have a major impact the page about the largest self proclaimed Unitarian organization, the UU Church. If we could somehow settle this before the RFC, I would "leave good enough alone" regarding the name of that article, and will not advocate for a move. Thanks, Scott P. (talk) 13:08, 21 April 2015 (UTC)
 * 1) Moving the Unitarianism article to "Unitarianism (Traditional Christian)", and
 * 2) Creating another article to be titled "Unitarianism (UU)", which would somehow minimally disambiguate for readers of that page that Humanism/ Atheism is the dominant theology of UU Unitarians.


 * Unitarianism has a clearly documented history from the 16th century, and there is evidence that the christology goes back much farther than that. Unitarian Universalism, however, was created in 1961 out of two organizations formed in 1825 and 1866. That is to say, unitarianism is centuries, perhaps millennia, older than Unitarian Universalism. This article is about unitarianism, not about a specific, very new organization that has adopted some elements of unitarianism.


 * I am not the one confusing unitarianism with UU: I am trying very hard to keep the distinction between them sharp. For starters, there is no such thing as "Christian Unitarian" theology, as that implies there is a non-Christian unitarian theology. By definition, unitarianism is a statement about Jesus' nature and his relationship with God. That a basically non-Christian faith such as UU uses the same word to describe itself is irrelevant, and I believe it to be adequately handled in this article's current hat note: This article is about Unitarianism as a Christian theology. For the liberal religious movement, see Unitarian Universalism. For other uses, see Unitarianism (disambiguation). If this is confusing to you, please explain why and we can work out a compromise.


 * If you wish to make a Request for Discussion, I would welcome it. It would not be the first time we have had the discussion of painting a very old, well documented belief with the shellac of a young upstart, and I doubt it will be the last time, either. Until that discussion is concluded, I would ask that you respect the current consensus for this article and stop trying to make it all about Unitarian Universalism. TechBear  &#124; Talk Contributions 16:07, 21 April 2015 (UTC)


 * You wrote:


 * I am not the one confusing unitarianism with UU: I am trying very hard to keep the distinction between them sharp. For starters, there is no such thing as "Christian Unitarian" theology, as that implies there is a non-Christian unitarian theology.


 * The UU's would claim to have their own "theology of sorts", a non-Christian theology I suppose, please read: The Theology of Unitarian Universalists.


 * You wrote:


 * By definition, unitarianism is a statement about Jesus' nature and his relationship with God. That a basically non-Christian faith such as UU uses the same word to describe itself is irrelevant....


 * Regarding what UU Unitarianism is about, one of the holders of the "majority view amongst self professed Unitarians" would beg to differ, he wrote: "Unitarianism is about becoming fully awake to the realization that we all share in the unity of life and should be one in the unity of love." See: Unitarian versus Fundamentalist Approaches to Spirituality, Religion and Life.


 * You wrote:


 * ...I believe it (the UU view) to be adequately handled in this article's current hat note: This article is about Unitarianism as a Christian theology. For the liberal religious movement, see Unitarian Universalism. For other uses, see Unitarianism (disambiguation). If this is confusing to you, please explain why and we can work out a compromise.


 * Why did I find this "disambiguation" within the article confusing? Because first, after reading the "hat note" or disambiguation note, I really had no idea what was liberal and what was Christian.  I asked myself, "Aren't many Christians liberal?" I happen to be liberal and I also consider myself to be a Christian.  I didn't have any idea what was trying to be said there, so I continued to read on down the article.  Next, after reading the first paragraph of the article, knowing what I personally know about the "majority view" amongst "self proclaimed Unitarians", I knew that the first paragraph did not at all represent this majority view, and please forgive me, but at first it seemed to me that the first paragraph might have been written by someone with a personal agenda.  I first came to the article to get an "overview" of Unitarianism, but all I found was a "micro-view" of what I initially believed was a completely dead and nearly forgotten view of it, without any contextualization.  By analogy, it felt like getting off a plane in Rome Italy might feel, knowing how to speak Italian, but the customs officer there will only agree to speak in Latin to you, and then, by his rather cavalier attitude, he seems to be implying to you that nobody else there will really speak Italian with you either, and by the way, he says (in Latin), I'm not going to tell you where the bathroom is either!  Frustrating to say the least.  At least that was how I felt. Please don't get me wrong.  Latin is a wonderful language, and is certainly deserving of in-depth study, but not when others seem to be "forcing it upon you".


 * I fully agree with your apparent view that the article should not in any way legitimize the current UU theology as true Unitarianism, which indeed no longer seems to me to have any resemblance to historical Unitarianism either. But that doesn't mean that we have to pretend that UU theology is non existent, or to try to vaguely imply that UU theology is "illegitimate".  I say, let our readers make this determination on their own.  By stating clearly in the disambiguation area something like:
 * I think something like this would say it all. Why not say it? And why not repeat something like it in the beginning of the first paragraph?  Why now insist that a typical uninformed new reader has to  stumble around in the article for several minutes before even gaining the slightest glimmering of the "big picture" of what has happened, and what is happening with the term: Unitarinism? Scott P. (talk) 21:56, 21 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Since you have voiced no objections to this revised compromise, I am going to now insert it. Scott P. (talk) 22:26, 22 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Since you have voiced no objections to this revised compromise, I am going to now insert it. Scott P. (talk) 22:26, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

b4 300s
kristianiti=unitarianithout?(b4triniticoncept acepted81.11.230.198 (talk) 07:25, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

reduce material about Biblical Unitarianism in one Italian church
I've cut all this as hopelessly disproportionate. I know it's in the page history, but I'm putting it out here as well, in case anyone can find a better use for it. Maybe another article? But given that the whole section on Biblical Unitarianism was tagged as of dubious relevance to this article, I do think the length on Italy is doubly unuseful. Carbon Caryatid (talk) 14:17, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

This Movement in Italy claims a strong Christian and biblical soul. From the analysis of documents that you can find on the official site of the CCI, it is clear that the doctrinal position of this Christian confession of faith is therefore akin to the so-called Biblical Unitarian movement    and on the other hand, far from that of the non-Christian churches in the Unitarian Universalist Association who, although sharing a 16th-century origin, have been influenced by many non-biblical ideas (e.g., Universalism). That Association does included unitarian Christian churches such as King's Chapel, Boston, linked with the Unitarian Universalist Christian Fellowship. The Christian Church in Italy has significant similarities with the Biblical Unitarian movement, although it maintains a cautious position on some doctrinal points. Wilbur wrote about the Unitarian Movement: "The religious movement whose history we are endeavoring to trace...became fully developed in thought and polity in only four countries, one after another, namely Poland, Transylvania, England and America. But in each of these it showed, along with certain individual characteristics, a general spirit, a common point of view, and a doctrinal pattern that tempt one to regard them as all outgrowths of a single movement which passed from one to another; for nothing could be more natural than to presume that these common features implied a common ancestry. Yet such is not the fact, for in each of these four lands the movement, instead of having originated elsewhere, and been translated only after attaining mature growth, appears to have sprung independently and directly from its own native roots, and to have been influenced by other and similar movements only after it had already developed an independent life and character of its own."

The Christian Church in Italy believes that God is only One Person in direct contrast with the doctrine of the Trinity which defines God as Three coexisting Persons in one Substance (Essence), merged into one being. So CCI adheres to strict monotheism by believing that Jesus was a perfect and holy man, virginally begotten in Mary, the promised Christ (i.e., Messiah), the Son of God, and is now at the right hand of God praying for the whole Church. A continuing non-Trinitarian unitarian Christian Church is the Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church of Ireland, with all except two of its congregations in Northern Ireland.

The Christian Church in Italy rejects certain traditional Christian doctrines including the soteriological doctrines of original sin and predestination. The CCI is distinct from other religious movements which exalt Jesus as the only true God, as for example the Oneness Pentecostalism, the United Pentecostal Church International, and the True Jesus Church.

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 * Replaced Fiddlersmouth (talk) 01:15, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

The word "settle"
Unfamiliar (to me) usage, meaning perhaps something like appointed or hired? Can't find in Merriam-Webster.

Examples: "...was by King's Chapel in Boston, which settled James Freeman (...) in 1782, ..." and "... Channing (...) was settled over the Federal Street Church..."

--Hordaland (talk) 08:49, 20 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Oxford English Dictionary gives as meaning 27b " (Chiefly Sc[ottish]. and U.S.) To appoint (a minister) to the charge of a parish; also, to appoint a minister to (a parish)." Unusually, it cites Webster's American Dictionary of the English Language as one of it quotes of usage, in 1818. " To be ordained or installed over a parish, church or congregation. A. B. was invited to settle in the first society in New Haven." So yes, the secular equivalent would be as you suggest. I note a flavour of permanence in the word: the congregation used to make do with travelling preachers and lay ministers, but last year Reverend Smith settled here. (Or "was settled"? The church settled Rev Smith?). Carbon Caryatid (talk) 11:23, 20 December 2016 (UTC)

Is Unitarianism Protestant?
thoughts?Ernio48 (talk) 16:48, 29 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Historically, we might be justified in regarding the movement as a philosophically extreme form of Protestantism, but the term only has relevance in a Christian setting. Many modern Unitarians would be offended to be described as Christian. Fiddlersmouth (talk) 02:18, 30 December 2016 (UTC)


 * I'm glad this article is getting some attention. I suspect it needs to be split, but first discussed more widely (i.e. at project level), This article is so unsatisfactory for the average person who might need it. If there's a reference to "Quakers, Unitarians, and Liberal Jews" in the news (e.g. ), and the curious reader googles an unfamiliar term, they will be led to:
 * https://www.unitarian.org.uk/
 * And at the top of that website: The Unitarians, Unitarianism explained, Unitarians, What is a Unitarian. One small-type mention of the full title of the organisation, that's all. But no one says General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches - the people are known as Unitarians. How can we best present this clearly to the casual reader? Carbon Caryatid (talk) 17:54, 31 December 2016 (UTC)
 * I saw someone added a line about Protestantism to the lead the other day, so I've been looking to see how reliable sources describe Unitarianism when they're referring to pre-1960s (aka pre-merger with Universalism) Unitarianism. I wanted to look into it a little more before clarifying the statement in the lead, but I'm getting the sense that reliable sources are saying it had been considered a liberal or progressive Protestant denomination.
 * , as far as splitting the article. What are you thinking needs to be split, since there are already articles for Unitarian Universalism, Biblical Unitarianism, and Universalism (to name a few). I think we might be ok with the existing articles if they all stuck to their topic. Instead, they all try to cover a little bit of everything. IMO Unitarian should redirect to Unitarian Universalism and this article should be called Unitarianism (Christianity) or something like that, but that's a discussion for another time. —PermStrump  ( talk )  20:02, 31 December 2016 (UTC)
 * I crossed out that last line, because as I'm reading more, I realize that doesn't quite make sense either. I think this set of articles needs to be restructured, because I don't think they'd be helpful at all for people who never heard of Unitarianism, but every time I think of something that might be a good way to organize it, I read something else that makes me change my mind. I suppose I understand how it has been left the way it is for so long. —PermStrump  ( talk )  22:41, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

This should be the main article on Unitarianism
The redirects to this page are: Christian Unitarianism and Unitarian Chapel, neither of which get many hits. This page gets the most |Unitarian_Universalism|Biblical_Unitarianism|History_of_Unitarianism|Universalism|Nontrinitarianism|Socinianism|General_Assembly_of_Unitarian_and_Free_Christian_Churches pageviews out of all articles in the Unitarian family — Unitarianism, Unitarian Universalism, Universalism, Nontrinitarianism, Socinianism, History of Unitarianism, General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches (British Unitarianism), and Biblical Unitarianism (listed in order from most to least pageviews). The disambiguation page (Unitarian), describes this page as, "a liberal Christian theological movement..." and it defines Unitarian Universalism as, "a liberal pluralistic religious movement that grew out of Unitarianism". So this page that gets the most hits is only about a minor aspect of Unitarianism.

The majority of people are not coming to this page looking for information specifically on the Unitarian movement within Christianity, because it's almost never used that way in reliable sources except in talking about the history of the modern Unitarian movement. The predominant usage of "Unitarianism" today is unequivocally in reference to the modern liberal, pluralist, humanist Unitarian congregations that go by various longer names depending on the country, e.g., Unitarian Universalism in the U.S., the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches in the U.K., etc., that fall under the umbrella of the International Council of Unitarians and Universalists.

IMO this should be a summary-style umbrella article with hatnotes at the top of each section that lead to more information about the various subtopics related to Unitarianism. I also think Unitarian and Unitarians should redirect here and the disambiguation page should be Unitarian (disambiguation).

That was really hard to articulate. I hope it made some sense. —PermStrump ( talk )  02:25, 1 January 2017 (UTC)


 * You are absolutely right, User:Permstrump, that this set of articles offers a very tricky mess of overlap, and as they stand are unhelpful to our readers. I am delighted that finally someone is digging into current scholarly material, and looking at how people use Wikipedia, and can confirm the modern usage I had always understood.
 * If I am correct, you are proposing a re-working of the set of articles connected to the word or idea "Unitarian". I suggest you alert a wider group of editors, partly to solicit help and partly to pre-empt edit-warring. You can do so by modifying and re-posting what you've written above, using relevant wiki-projects. I can see three:


 * For obvious reasons the discussion of re-organising a group of related articles needs to take place on one page, lest arguments get split and missed; for courtesy and to encourage participation, brief notes should be posted to other talkpages, pointing editors towards the main discussion. So my question is, if you are prepared to begin this process, where should the discussion take place? My inclination would be at WikiProject Religion, because a) it's the most neutral of the three (no one is disputing that Unitarian* is a religious topic), and b) the UU work group is very low in activity and WikiProject Christianity is very high, skewing the results one way or the other.


 * See also WikiProject Religion/Manual of style. I can't lead on this long-overdue re-organisation, but I can help. Carbon Caryatid (talk) 15:04, 1 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the insight! I'll try to start a larger conversation in a few days when I'll have more time to dedicate to following up. —PermStrump  ( talk )  02:56, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

Is Unitarianism part of Christianism?
I am surprised by the fact that Unitarianism appears within the title of Christianism. Christianity is defined by the notion that Christ is God, so it should not be. That is the reason, for instance, that although Islam believes Christ is a prophet and inspired by God (as does Unitarianism), it is not a Christian faith. I do not know how to fix this in the Wikipedia page, but it is essential to make that distinction. I understand the confusion might be brought up by the origin and relevance of Christi within the Unitarian faith, but it is nontheless a non-Christian movement. In this theological sense, it should be put in a similar category with other non-Crhsitian faiths of Christian origins, as for instance denomintions like the Mormons.
 * Many Christians have difficulty with the divinity of Christ. The Gnostics certainly viewed Christ differently from Trinitarians, but must still be viewed as Christian. Early Unitarianism was heavily Christocentric, it simply rejected the Trinity. While the modern church holds a diversity of faith, it still has an important place in Liberal Christianity, and is yet more important in the history of the movement. Your restrictive definition of Christianity excludes many branches of the faith. Fiddlersmouth (talk) 01:26, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

Explanation missing from articles on trinitarianism and unitarianism
The theological differences arise from the misuse of the word persona, which originally meant the mask held by an actor. The meaning of the word also came to include the modern English use of the word person. God can be a trinity of personas without there being three persons inside. The Father, Son and Spirit are simply 3 separate roles by which God interacts with man. No one can see the face of God and live, so He must show Himself through a filter/mask. Each persona is fully God because it's the same actor holding the mask. 2602:304:B183:4220:4C37:D167:A5A0:2CDB (talk) 00:46, 20 March 2017 (UTC)David

Tim Berners-Lee
Should not the list of "Notable Unitarians" in this article mention Tim Berners-Lee?Vorbee (talk) 19:27, 2 June 2017 (UTC)
 * He's in List of Unitarians, Universalists, and Unitarian Universalists. Lady  of  Shalott  01:52, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

Arianism Defined
The article defines Arianism as the belief in a pre-existing Logos, but ascertained that followers "maintained that Jesus was created and lived as human only". This isn't Arianism at all. Bearing in Mind that Arius' original writings were destroyed by his enemies, we STILL know that he and his followers considered Jesus to be more than just a normal human man, and ascribed godlike powers to him in much the same was as the Trinitarians did, just without asserting his equality with the Father. This description is basically Socinianism with a pre-existing Logos, and should be examined. DesScorp (talk) 05:22, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

Ambiguous or garbled sentence?
In the Radical Reformation and Anabaptist movements of the 16th century this idea resurfaced with Sozzini's uncle, Lelio Sozzini.

True or not, this would make sense, "In the Radical Reformation and Anabaptist movements of the 16th century this idea resurfaced."

And, true or not, this would make sense, "This idea resurfaced with Sozzini's uncle, Lelio Sozzini."

But merged together it makes little sense. Lelio Sozzini was a leader of all the Radical Reformation and all the Anabaptist movements?

BTW, is there any proof that he was associated with the Anabaptists?

Could one of you experts please expand a bit, please?

2600:1700:D010:B1C0:8D38:E2F9:4811:1B24 (talk) 04:28, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Freedom, reason and tolerance
This article could mention that Unitarians today emphasise freedom, reason and tolerance (and that does sound like a Trinity of values). Vorbee (talk) 16:19, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

Article structure
IMO, parts of the (currently very long) intro should be moved into the main body of the article, some with (sub)section titles and citations, as needed. I myseelf am not familiar enough with the topic to do this well. Acwilson9 (talk) 21:00, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

Merger Proposal
Why is this a separate article from Nontrinitarianism? 110.174.77.204 (talk) 15:43, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Please keep the discussion to one talk page, for ease of use. The hatnote on this article distinguishes between the two, and it's clearly going to be difficult to simply merge them, as they are both long articles... you'd have to spin one of them out into a separate article anyway. Richard3120 (talk) 17:27, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

The ICUU
I met some difficulties in checking some of this content against citations and had to ferret out some more precise urls. However the websites are a mixture of archaic archived sites and more recent official sites which have not been updated with any consistency. A previous editor seems also to have introduced some original research which I had to unpick in favour of the citations. I suspect the editor was on the ball but lacking the necessary verification, though I found a good source for the inclusion of Poland which had been omitted from "Member Groups". In short, the ICUU content is beset with problems. I guess the same must apply to its main article, in respect of which I found a very detailed pdf source and added it to the external links for that article. Bjenks (talk) 13:16, 15 January 2020 (UTC)

Hatnote
I figured I'd leave a short note about my recent edit to the hatnote, which previously read:


 * This article is about the Christian theology. For the liberal religious movement, see Unitarian Universalism. For its UK counterpart, see General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches. For other uses, see Unitarian.

The first part of this seemed to contradict (or at least cause confusion) with this sentence in the Terminology section:


 * To avoid confusion, this article is about Unitarianism as a religious movement (proper noun). For the generic form of unitarianism (the Christology), see Nontrinitarianism.

I'm certainly not learned enough in the specifics of the topic to say whether there is a technical difference between referring to a 'Unitarian theology' and a 'nontrinitarian Christology,' but that's also sort of my problem with the way this is framed. I'd in fact found the article looking for information on nontrinitarianism, and until the link to nontrinitarianism in the introduction, I had assumed based on that hatnote that I was on the right article. As such, I saw fit to specifically disambiguate between this article and the nontrinitarianism article in the hatnote, which is the purpose of my recent edit. I hope this does not prove controversial, as I mean only to enhance the navigability of the encyclopædia. 76.10.184.83 (talk) 13:46, 30 November 2018 (UTC)


 * I agree. I changed the hatnote to say 'Christian theological movement' rather than 'Christian theology' to better distinguish it from the doctrine page. ParallelFrog (talk) 01:57, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Differences between "Sources", "Bibliography", and "Further reading"?
Greetings and felicitations recent editors. I'm puzzled—what are the differences between the contents of the "Sources", "Bibliography", and "Further reading" (sub-)sections? "Further reading" by itself I understand, but why have both a "Sources" subsection and a "Bibliography" section? Can any of these be combined and/or renamed to alleviate confusion? —DocWatson42 (talk) 07:39, 8 July 2020 (UTC)
 * I think sources and bibliography sections can be combined. --Hazhk (talk) 08:01, 8 July 2020 (UTC)
 * If they are to be combined, I'd prefer moving the contents of the "Bibliography" section into a renamed "General sources" subsection in the "References" section for clarity. —DocWatson42 (talk) 08:52, 8 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Any further comment? —DocWatson42 (talk) 08:11, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
 * The "References" section should contain both the subsections "Bibliography" and "Notes" (although it's not always the case, since they are separated sections in many articles), while the purpose of the "Further reading" section is to display further informations that can be found in additional sources unused in the article. In my opinion, I think that the references listed under the "Sources" section should be moved to the "Bibliography" section, and consequently the "Sources" section should be removed, there's no point to keep it.--GenoV84 (talk) 12:40, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
 * For clarity I prefer "Citations" to "Notes" (since "Notes" can and often is used for explanations) and "General references/sources(/bibliography)" to "Bibliography" (which can also mean "a list of works by the subject of the article"). Your thoughts (those of anyone else)? —DocWatson42 (talk) 12:51, 14 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Interesting, if there is not a general rule for that. I'd follow the format used at the Nikola Tesla article, but having Notes above completely separate - as sometimes it conatins explanations unrelated to the other mwentioned. The only other remark would be, if bibliography would not not be abandoned as "further reading" would cover it.(KIENGIR (talk) 14:05, 14 August 2020 (UTC))