Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Seventh-day Adventist historicist interpretations of Bible prophecy (2nd nomination)


 * 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. (non-admin closure) CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 06:53, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

Seventh-day Adventist historicist interpretations of Bible prophecy
AfDs for this article: 
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I previously AFD'd this article as a WP:NOT violation, "non-notable religious analysis essay full of unencyclopedic tone and cruft." It was closed as no consensus due to keep !votes noting the large amount of sources. However, on closer inspection, virtually all sources are published by boutique publishing houses owned by the denomination itself. (WP:IS) Further, the article has become even cruftier and reads as an obscure eschatological analysis. It is absolutely inappropriate as a general encyclopedia article. James (talk/contribs) 15:01, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Christianity-related deletion discussions. James (talk/contribs) 15:46, 2 December 2017 (UTC)


 * Keep As was pointed out in the talk page a year and a half ago, this article provides information in a wikipedia style that represents the view of the SDA church on prophecy, specifically the book of Daniel.  I followed Wikipedia policy as noted below.
 * Undue weight: “Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserves as much attention overall as the majority view. Views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views.” And, “Theories and viewpoints held by a minority should not receive as much attention as the majority view, and views held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views.... Minority views can receive attention on pages specifically devoted to them… But on such pages, though a view may be spelled out in great detail, it should not be represented as the truth.”
 * The Book of Daniel presents a detailed discussion of several views about Daniel and the prophecies according to their due weight. But, this article is about a single minor viewpoint, so the concern of due or undue weight is a mute point.  However, there is a hatnote that links to the Book of Daniel and the Book of Revelation where that is of concern.  The article is a part in a series on the Seventh-day Adventist church and its beliefs.
 * Reliable Sources: “Questionable sources should only be used as sources for material on themselves, such as in articles about themselves”… “ “Questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities, without the self-published source requirement that they be published experts in the field.”
 * Following this policy, this article uses SDA sources to provide information about an SDA belief. This article does not discuss other viewpoints.  Those can be found at Book of Daniel or Book of Revelation.  By its very nature, this article is religious no more detailed than the general Book of Daniel.  The SDA church has about 20 million members and it maintains 78 publishing houses around the world, so this is hardly a boutique publishing concern.  --MindyWaters (talk) 16:21, 2 December 2017 (UTC)


 * keep not seeing a valid rationale for deletion. Artw (talk) 16:45, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Comment See the previous comprehensive AfD.  Unscintillating (talk) 00:38, 3 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Keep Note that independence is an issue for notability, not for reliability.  What matters to Wikipedia is reliability.  Not only that, notability cannot be challenged at this AfD, because this is a spinout article.  Nor is the analysis of independence correct, as the essay cited in the nomination, WP:IS, states that independence avoids "undue attention to the subject's own views."  What are the views of the subject here?  Does this subject have money in the bank being used to get the views from Daniel represented in front of the views from Revelation?  Where is the evidence?  Unscintillating (talk) 00:38, 3 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Independence is absolutely an issue for notability -- it's in the GNG itself: "reliable sources that are independent of the subject" (emphasis added). Once you remove the non-independent sources, there's virtually no sourcing for this article. Further, summary style does not override the requirement for notability; every article must meet the GNG, regardless of whether it comes from a split or not. James (talk/contribs) 23:33, 6 December 2017 (UTC)
 * I say, "...independence is an issue for notability" and you say, "Independence is...an issue for notability". Why does your tone make it sound like this is disagreement?  Perhaps you are confused about the role of notability in the encyclopedia, as articles don't have to show notability, which is the same thing as saying that notability has no content requirements (see WP:ARTN, WP:NNC, WP:NEXIST).  Topics need notability to be standalone topics (WP:N lede).  I've heard it argued that spinouts must be on topics that show notability in their own right.  But it can never be the case that a spinout can be deleted for notability, as the remedy, if there is such a thing as a non-notable spinout topic, is to merge the spinout back into the parent.  This is a decision made on talk pages by content specialists, not in a deletion forum by deletion specialists.  Unscintillating (talk) 03:46, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Comment I have notified Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Christianity/Noticeboard, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Skepticism, and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Religion. James (talk/contribs) 05:06, 3 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Keep -- Eschatology is a significant aspect of Christian theology. SDA is a large denomination, differing from most other denominations in its theology.  The SDA view on this subject is thus notable.  This is an article about a point of view (which is legitimate), not expressing a point of view (which is not).  The complaint about relying on books from SDA publishing houses is not a legitimate one: where else will one find a Reliable Source on SDA views; it would be a legitimate complaint if the article related to the views of Christians generally, but the article on that is noted in a "See also" capnote.  The complaint that this is not covering other eschatological views is also wrong, as an early section covers Futurist and Praeterist views: we may need articles on SDA views on those theological positions.  I am not a SDA member and normally refrain from commenting on those I regard as heretical sects.  Peterkingiron (talk) 16:21, 3 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Keep This was linked to on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Christianity/Noticeboard‎‎. I was not otherwise aware of the article or this discussion. When reading the nominator's reasons, I expected to see a short, poorly referenced topic with a great deal of opinion as to why the rest of Christianity is wrong. A quick glance shows me that's not the case. The article is well written, balanced, and extremely well referenced. That it's a niche topic is not a reason to delete. That the references are almost entirely all from the denomination isn't either. That would be like saying that we should delete Revolver (Beatles album) because almost all of the sources are from the music industry. Granted, there are more than 400 references on that article while only 169 for this article. Who else would be interested enough in the topic to write about it? It is now too large to be sufficiently merged into a general article on the topic. And I know several people who are not SDA but are quite interested in their interpretation of prophecy. Walter Görlitz (talk) 15:32, 5 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Keep. Article is well-referenced, verifiable, and specific enough in scope for its own article. Brad  v  15:59, 5 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Bible-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 00:52, 8 December 2017 (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.