Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Mahavira/archive4

Mahavira

 * Nominator(s): Capankajsmilyo(Talk 13:14, 6 February 2019 (UTC)

This article is about the last God of Jainism, a level-4 vital article. There has been a lot of improvement since last nomination and GOCE has performed CE on it as well. Capankajsmilyo(Talk 13:14, 6 February 2019 (UTC)

Oppose by Squeamish Ossifrage
Pedantically, there's an open peer review request, which is contrary to FAC nomination policy. But opposing on that ground is bureaucracy for its own sake, and the article has real concerns. Normally, I look mostly at sources, source use, and reference formatting. That's a problem here, too. Right off the top: the article uses a mixture of cite family and citation templates, linking is a mess, there's at least one unused source, some entries have missing essential information, and modern reprints of older or religious publications are treated incorrectly.) But that's hardly the biggest reason to oppose promotion. This article has been soundly rejected at FAC three times previously, all for fundamentally the same reason, and that reason is still evident in the article being nominated now. The prose does not distinguish between the historical personage of Mahavira and the Jain mythic figure of Mahjavira. As a result, it expresses religious statements as statements of fact in Wikipedia's voice. Examining only the lead: And so forth. Things do not improve after the lead.
 * Mahavira, also known as Vardhamāna, was the twenty-fourth tirthankara (ford-maker) who revived Jainism. The entire concept of the "twenty-fourth tirthankara" is a religious one being presented as fact; I have no idea what is meant by the claim that he "revived" Jainism. Okay, technically, I do, but a lay reader won't. And the claim being made here in Wikipedia's voice is not an uncontroversial one; the historicity of Parshvanatha is complicated and... anyway, this sentence in the lead is inadequate at best at addressing the issue. As an aside, so is the body of the article.
 * The next several sentences are all about the religious interpretation of Mahavira's life. That's fine for what it is, but that needs to be more clearly separated from discussion of Mahavira's historicity.
 * Scholars such as Karl Potter consider his biography uncertain; some suggest that he lived in the 5th century BC, contemporaneously with the Buddha. Failure of WP:SUMMARYSTYLE. Potter is not mentioned in the article body. Also, I'm fairly sure that in the historical sense, we should be referring to "Siddhārtha Gautama" or "Gautama Buddha", rather than "the Buddha".
 * Mahavira attained nirvana at the age of 72, and his body was cremated. Immediately before this was text discussing the historical Mahavira, so the natural assumption is that this sentence is also. Historical people do not "attain[] nirvana". They die.
 * After attaining Kevala Jnana... A new paragraph in the lead means that there is no reader guidance regarding the nature of the information about to presented, so the default assumption is that the statements are to be read in Wikipedia's voice. It is not acceptable to claim that a historical figure attained omniscience in Wikipedia's voice.

I am very sorry to be this aggressively opposed to a nomination. especially one whose editors have obviously put in a lot of time and effort. But this does not meet the FA standard. It does not meet the GA standard. This article needs to be fundamentally restructured. It needs careful source evaluation to differentiate authors discussing Mahavira as an aspect of the Jain religion versus authors that discuss Mahavira's historicity, and to ensure that mytho-religious claims are not being presented in Wikipedia's voice. The other issues, like the mess of its current reference formatting, are all very much secondary. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 16:30, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

Coord note
Although I think the article has improved since we last saw it here, based on the concerns identified above I can only repeat my closing comments from the previous FAC; as part of that, it may be worthwhile simply leaving the active PR open and seeking out comments from relevant wikiprojects. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 08:42, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

Ian Rose (talk) 08:42, 13 February 2019 (UTC)