Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Hyperetes


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   keep. JForget 23:36, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

Hyperetes

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This article duplicates wikt:Hyperetes and is a word definition rather than an encyclopaedic article. As a PROD was removed without discussion, this is an opportunity to discuss the appropriateness of deletion. Ash (talk) 09:36, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

The word is not in the en. wiktionary (maybe because it is not even an english one). It is a term title, belonging to ancient Greece,Hellenistic Judaism and New Testament.Catalographer (talk) 10:05, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Wiktionary accepts short definitions for words. Otherwise the term belongs to wikipedia.Catalographer (talk) 10:09, 4 September 2009 (UTC)


 * I was going by the transwiki move. At the time of AFD nomination I had not realized someone had deleted http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Hyperetes since then. I'm not actually that sure I understand the rationale for Wikt deletion (No usable content given) as the content looked pretty usable to me. The argument that en.wikt would not include such a word seems to contradict http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Index:Ancient_Greek .—Ash (talk) 10:29, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Yes υπηρέτης in Greek alphabet is acceptable there. Check a similiar term Doulos(slave)Catalographer (talk) 10:33, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep. Seems to be a quite reasonable article about an ancient Greek title.  Yes, it's "about a word", but then so are duke, sheriff, and for that matter cat.  The fact that a subject is a social construction does not turn every such subject into an extended dictionary definition.  If this text duplicates Wiktionary, that suggests that the Wiktionary entry wants editing, not that this should be deleted. - Smerdis of Tlön (talk) 14:05, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep this needs cleanup so that it reads less like a dictionary definition of the word and more about what the term has meant at various times and places (currently it is between the two), but this is not something that deleting it will help. Thryduulf (talk) 22:35, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Language-related deletion discussions. Thryduulf (talk) 22:35, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. Thryduulf (talk) 22:35, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep, but rewrite to deemphasize the "dictionary tone". It is the title that is encyclopedic, not the word that represents the title.  And by the way, where did the absurd concept come from that "short definitions" are all Wiktionary accepts and that Wikipedia should accept everything else?  Powers T 15:50, 5 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Apologies. Wikipedia does not accept anything else but wiktionary has normally very short definitions.Catalographer (talk) 14:06, 6 September 2009 (UTC)
 * That's because most words don't need long definitions. Where words do need longer definitions, they have them at Wiktionary. Do remember though that Wiktionary is even further from being finished than the English Wikipedia is. Thryduulf (talk) 17:48, 6 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, there seems to be a perception that Wiktionary entries are intended to be brief. It's not true, but even if it was, it's irrelevant to Wikipedia's operation.  Powers T 12:58, 7 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep -- This is actually an article about the meaning of a ancient Greek term. It is not (as far as I am aware), an English word.  Smith's work which is incorporated in more in the nature of an encyclopaedia than a dictionary, despite its name.  Peterkingiron (talk) 16:16, 6 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Commment While I agree this article should be kept, I feel compelled to point out that as the English Wiktionary "accepts all words in all languages" and there are Wiktionaries in many other languages that do exactly the same, if this article were a dictionary definition, it wouldn't matter what language it was a definition of a term in, it could still be transwikied to Wiktionary. Thryduulf (talk) 14:36, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep. Right about Smith's. And the current Hyperetes entry is not at all written like a dictionary definition; did I miss something? It doesn't explain the term as a semantic and syntactical entity, but functionally as a concept, both in the context of magistracies at Athens, and in Greek Jewish texts, in a way that is not characteristic of a dictionary. The article already has five footnotes. Although I don't see any significant article links at present, I can see the potential for linking from articles on related topics already touched on here. Besides, if this were a character on a sitcom that lasted four episodes, there are those who say that a few million people saw it and that by definition makes it notable; I don't agree, but I wouldn't try to delete such an article. But then again, I guess I'm one of them-thar inclusionists. I say if it's got sources (in this case quite respectable scholarly sources), and it Does No Harm, and potentially provides somebody benefit (say, by popping up on a Google search of the term), exactly what is the rationale for deleting it? Unlike the aforementioned sitcom character, this article in its tiny way increases Wikipedia's scholarly gravitas. If the term has remained in use for, oh, more than two millennia, I'd say there isn't much of a basis to call it ephemerally trivial. (For instance, the gravitas article right now is pretty much a dictionary entry; however, it's a stub, and a discussion of the term in its Roman cultural context, and a look at how and why the latin term survives into contemporary usage, would make it an encyclopedia article.) Yes, the Hyperetes article is narrow and of minuscule importance in the cosmic scheme of things; but it meets notability criteria. Cynwolfe (talk) 13:03, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.