Talk:Xian (Taoism)

Wow
With all due appreciation for Keah's desire for thoroughness, this page is a mess. If the best we can do is a laundry-list translation-dictionary introduction and a list of pages-long blockquote citations, we should port this over to a wiktionary entry. That's what their new Citation page is for. I'm sure there's a decent article on Taoist immortals somewhere in here, though. For those who have time to fix it, a good place to start is this edit, although obviously you'd want to keep the corrections and improvements made to that content since.

It probably is also overdue for a move to an, although whether that is immortal, Taoist immortal, &c. would need some research. — Llywelyn II   00:08, 2 August 2014 (UTC)


 * It should be Immortal (Chinese mythology), all considering that it's not solely specific to Daoism but may as well apply to various folk religions etcetera. But I agree, it should be moved. --Cold Season (talk) 18:52, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Six years on this has only become more of a mess than it already was. Pace Cold Season, our page is still at Taoism and there's no such thing as "a Chinese folk religion" or "Chinese mythology" that doesn't fall under Taoism at present, although there are a few minor and very specific sects that have a separate theology apart from general Taoism. The page is already nonsensically dabbed using Taoism, but should be at its  Taoist immortal if we're going to dab xian at all because people can't learn to spell Xi'an correctly. —  Llywelyn II   05:03, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 20 October 2023

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. (non-admin closure) Rotideypoc41352 (talk · contribs) 04:52, 5 November 2023 (UTC)

Xian (Taoism) → Xian (Chinese mythology) – As discussed prior, Xian is not solely specific to Daoism and applies to Chinese folk religions in general. ChenDaoIsHere (talk) 12:44, 20 October 2023 (UTC) — Relisting. Polyamorph (talk) 20:25, 28 October 2023 (UTC)
 * ChenDaoIsHere, maybe just Xian (mythology)? The less disambiguation, the better, and luckily 'xian' is a pretty Chinese lexeme. :) — Remsense  聊  21:22, 26 October 2023 (UTC)
 * That can work. There was also a proprosal for it to be "Immortal (Chinese mythology)", but I prefer keeping the Chinese name. ChenDaoIsHere (talk) 23:59, 26 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Generally, if a term has a native translation, I heavily prefer using it (esp for one-character or many-character terms), as someone who speaks a bit of Chinese, it can be easy to forget how unhelpful plain pinyin terms can be for people not knowing the language, trying to learn about adjacent topics. Remsense  聊  00:05, 27 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Oppose Xian originated with and is almost always associated with Daoism. The present title is more specific than "Xian (Chinese mythology)". "Immortal" is an outright misnomer. Many xian hagiographies (even for the exemplar Peng Zu) give an age when he/she died. In normal English usage, an "immortal" never dies. Campany's To Live as Long as Heaven and Earth (2002: 4) says xian "is often translated as "immortal," but, strictly speaking, the texts promised neither a once-and-for-all immortality nor an escape from time and change into an eternal stasis, as can immediately be seen from the fact that there were distinct degrees or levels of xian-hood as well as from the fact that texts sometimes distinguish xian from those who have "merely" managed not to die (busi 不死)." Keahapana (talk) 22:46, 27 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Would you say there is a viable English calque for ? Remsense  聊  23:03, 27 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Not that I know of. Good question. Keahapana (talk) 00:11, 29 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Keahapana, in that case, it's certainly not apropos to invent one (though I'd love to try), so yes, I suppose the current title is the best available. — Remsense  聊  00:15, 29 October 2023 (UTC)
 * By "the current title", do you mean "Xian (Taoism)" or "Xian (mythology)"? —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 01:32, 29 October 2023 (UTC)
 * BarrelProof, I meant "Xian (Taoism)", my bad. Kea's context was persuasive. — Remsense  聊  01:34, 29 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Your comment was sufficiently clear; I just wasn't sure. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 22:22, 29 October 2023 (UTC)
 * ┌───────────────────────────┘ if you weren't sure, that's on me to make my comment more sufficiently clear! :)— Remsense  聊  22:37, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Oppose. There's a lot of overlap between Taoism & Chinese folk religions in general; logic of this nom would suggest that quite a lot of Taoism topics be disentangled from Taoism, but I'm not sure that's really the most helpful or expected by readers.  SnowFire (talk) 20:05, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

repeated additions
@119.236.164.50, please discuss this addition on both this page and Talk:Taoism. To me and others, it is largely redundant, clunky, and from a relatively low-quality source. — Remsense  诉  11:03, 1 February 2024 (UTC)