Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Christ myth theory/1

Christ myth theory

 * • Watch article reassessment page • Most recent review
 * Result: Delist. Judging from this discussion alone, it is clear that the POV issues have not yet been resolved, and there are WP:OWN problems going on that appear to be impeding a resolution. Because of this, the page is too unstable at the moment for it to remain a Good Article. Although articles can be re-nominated at any time, I would recommend re-nomination once a solution is reached (possibly through dispute resolution). Khoikhoi 03:57, 10 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Delist. This is an article about the theory that Jesus may not have existed as an historical figure. It was listed as a GA on February 22 this year on this version after a review by User:Afaprof01. I'm nominating it for a community reassessment because I feel it should not have been listed in the first place. I can't delist it myself because, although I'm not a major contributor, I'm currently in a content dispute on that page. The article has fallen under the control of three editors, Eugeneacurry, Bill the Cat 7, and Ari89. They have very strong views against the theory that Jesus did not exist, and have created an article that seeks to ridicule the theory and its sources. I became involved after the article failed two featured-article nominations; one in February and the second in April. It is POV, contains original commentary, reliable sources are missing, sources are insulted, there is little in-text attribution, editors who disagree are insulted, and the three of them revert constantly. There is also a concern that the article is a content fork. One editor raised this at the time of the review as a concern, but the reviewer did not heed it. Eugene has written a highly POV FAQ, and they insist that new editors read it before being allowed to comment. Their latest idea is to request that the article be protected against further contentious edits, which no admin would do, but it's illustrative of their failure to understand policy. The article has never been stable on a consensus version that I can see, and the talk archives are full of experienced editors voicing the same concerns going back many months. SlimVirgin talk  contribs 07:12, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Delist Comments - I entirely agree with SlimVirgin. I raised concerns regarding WP:NPOV at the article's FA candidature in April and other reviewers agreed that this was a problem. The article's Talk Page has become a hostile environment and attempts to reach consensus are difficult and very time consuming. The article in its current form violates WP:NPOV and should not be listed as a Good Article. Graham Colm (talk) 08:40, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Delist Comment There are numerous issues with this article. Some are detailed here. Anthony (talk) 09:18, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * This is not a good article due to ongoing POV issues, and uncertainty over the very meaning of the term. See the article's talk page. By all means close this discussion, but delist first. Anthony (talk) 01:33, 10 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment I have edited on this article on and off for several years and there is always disagreement on the talk page as you would guess. Recently however the talk page has become toxic and the disparaging comments in the article have ramped up massively, with Eugene leading a mission to write a "debunking" of the CMT. The theory is minor with an interesting history and some current popular support. It should be possible to illustrate its lack of academic acceptance without "skinhead", "flat-earth" and "moon landing hoax" insults. How this ever became a GA I don't understand. Sophia ♫  09:29, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment I am completely uninvolved in the content of this article but have taken administrative action including full protection of the page and blocking of at least two editors for issues related to it. Quite apart from the fact that a number of editors consider that there are issues with the NPOV of the article, the main problem is that it is clearly not stable when unprotected and therefore should not be a Good Article at this time. Black Kite (t) (c) 13:32, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Further comment I have had to fully protect the page again today due to the issues mentioned above. Black Kite (t) (c) 07:33, 22 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Delist I agree with SV, this article is biased and should be delisted. Sole Soul (talk) 04:25, 20 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment I believe this article is biased and fails to meet WP:NPOV. Looking at the anti-myth sources, they seem heavily weighted in favor of theologians and seminarians, who are trained from early childhood to believe unquestioningly that Jesus existed. To expect such biased sources to objectively and scientifically consider whether his existence was a myth, derived from other religions and myths, considered by them as heresies, defies common sense and cannot be seen as neutral or scientific. I think the article should be sourced primarily to professional historians, who have no dog in the race. Crum375 (talk) 02:34, 22 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Delist. As I noted elsewhere on this page, the article fails NPOV by focusing too heavily on religious authors, who were educated from early age to believe Jesus existed. Also, the article's title and key concept is CMT, but I have yet to see a clear and non-confusing definition. When I asked the article's editors below to please define it for me, I got two widely disparate responses. And when I asked them to categorize a list of simple statements, trying to find where the bright line between pro- and anti-CMT position falls, I was told it was "silly" to try to classify the statements, as it's like trying to decide "who is fat." I also feel that this article is a POV fork from the Historicity of Jesus, and should be merged into that article. Crum375 (talk) 21:49, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Further comment Here is another demonstration of the fact that CMT is ill-defined. A respected scholar wrote a recent book called "The Messiah myth", where according to the book's publisher, he "argues that the quest for the historical Jesus is beside the point, since the Jesus of the Gospels never existed." According to another reliable source reviewing this book, the author "is saying, a la Bruno Bauer, that someone in the Hellenistic period saw the need for a fictive ego-ideal/personal savior and invented Jesus to play that role." You'd think this would be a classical example of a "pro-CMT" author. Wrong. According to the article's main editors, this author, despite the above, does not qualify as a "mythicist", since the above sources are unreliable. So this respected Messiah Myth author, which a disinterested observer could easily see as a poster-child for CMT, is not included in the pro-CMT camp. Crum375 (talk) 12:59, 8 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Comment on this further comment Crum's statement here is almost a text book example of the tendentious and arguably dishonest criticism the Christ myth theory is routinely subjected to. Crum asked about Thompson on the talk page. Two different editors explained to him why Thompson isn't a mythicist. Rather than accept those explanations though, Crum dredged up an advertiser's blurb and a personal blog article in which the author admits that he's guessing at Thompson's point. Two long-time Christ myth theory (CMT) article editors explained to Crum that neither of these qualify as reliable source. Crum disagreed and posted to the RSN... which uniformly rejected the advertisment as a reliable source. But that hasn't deterred Crum; he just keeps right on attacking the Christ myth article, pretending that his proferred sources are reliable. As I said, this is textbook, and it illustrates the sort of motivation that underlies the complaints that the article is unduely negative (POV) in it's depiction of the CMT. Editors assume the theory is respectable, find that the article includes an ocean of reliable sources that indicate otherwise, and rather than defer to the sources the editors just assume that something fishy is going on. Please take these objections with several grains of salt. Eugene (talk) 14:50, 8 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Reply Eugene, I believe you are out of order. First, if you disagree with my Delist and brief comments, you should do so on the Talk page, not thread into my comments, just as no one has threaded yours. Second, I provided a link to the talk page thread, where everyone can follow it and form their own conclusions. Third, your statements about me are very rude, and close to a personal attack. I don't recall ever attacking you, or anyone else. I try to focus on content and policies, not on editors and their personalities, per WP:AGF. More specifically regarding the sources I referred to above, per WP:SPS, we are specifically allowed to rely on an expert publishing his views on his private website as a reliable source. And regarding the publisher's summary which I "dredged up", as you so kindly put it, I have yet to hear an experienced editor explain to me why, when a publisher of a book says that the author says X, we can't use that as a reliable source that the author says X in that book, according to the book's publisher. Crum375 (talk) 15:23, 8 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Delist. Indeed there are major POV problems with the article, as well as sourcing concerns, and WP:RS issues. The article is not at GA quality status at this point in time. -- Cirt (talk) 21:49, 28 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep as GA This nomination violates WP:POINT. SlimVirgin attempted a major rewritting campaign at the article, encountered major resistence, and then listed the article for review as revenge. She was aware of this article months ago (through its first FAC) and while she objected to it, she didn't bother submitting it then for GA review.  That only came after her ego was bruised a bit on the talk page. Eugene (talk) 20:56, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Further Comment: The POV issues have been resolved through discussion on the talk page and compromise; no disparaging insults appear anywhere in the article now--neither in-line or in the footnotes. Stability has also been greatly improved since the lock. Given these improvements (and the issue I mentioned above) please do not delist. Eugene (talk) 23:12, 7 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment. I have moved the long threaded discussion to the talk page. The focus here should be on whether the article meets the GA criteria. Further discussion on the talk page is welcome, as are clearly summarized views here. Thanks, Geometry guy 22:49, 1 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Delist per second comment by Crum375. PYRRHON  talk   04:29, 3 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep as GA per Eugene. Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 16:53, 3 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Delist, primarily for stability reasons, but also with concerns about the maintenance of NPOV. The POV problems are complex. The present version's lead gives the impression that the Christ myth theory has more scholarly credibility and adherents than appears to be the case. The present body text appears more thorough than the older version, but also has some subtle framing techniques (for example the lack of statements in the background section regarding the theory's minority nature, and the prevailing scholarly view) that appear to present a more sympathetic view of the myth theory than i understand the prevailing scholarly literature would support (i say that not having read the sources, but only the article and the talk page). Meanwhile, at the other end of the spectrum from the lead, the attempt to tag it as a "pseudohistory" article involves POV pushing in the opposite direction. Hence the NPOV problems and the stability issues are related. I have no particular view about the article's subject matter (other than that it is obviously a theory with few adherents), but the article does not appear to meet the criteria for GA at this point. Incidentally, I was disappointed to see the levels of aggression and ridicule being exhibited on the talk page by a number of contributors, much of it targeted toward Slimvirgin. Slim has an impressive track record of taking on WP articles about contentious subjects and working to ensure their compliance with WP policies and with NPOV (the main cases where I have seen her at work are her FACs Muhammad al-Durrah incident and Ian Tomlinson). Her good record and good mind should be giving more pause to the critics than appears to be the case. This discourtesy is probably contributing to the instability. I think delisting may have an additional side-effect of removing a little bit of the heat from the discussion, but the rest of it is up to some of the talk page participants. hamiltonstone (talk) 00:24, 6 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment. This GAR has now been open for some time, and so could be closed by anyone who has not contributed significantly to the article. Given the balance of views above, the obvious conclusion would be to delist the article. Unfortunately, I cannot do so, because I do believe that the article has improved significantly, and that some of the criticisms are now out of date. Instead I would prefer that this GAR be closed as "no action". The goal of Wikipedia is not to change the world, but to describe it as it is. The most useful slogan in my mind is "let the reader decide". Mainstream views should be presented as such, whether editors agree with them or not. Also Wikipedia does not need to endorse the mainstream: we should simply describe it and give it appropriate weight. We should likewise not ridicule alternative views, but simply describe them.
 * No one can really know what happened 2000 years ago: an encyclopedia reports on what we do know and what are the views of current scholarship. I believe this GAR has served the purpose of improving the article in this light, and drawing editors together accordingly. Geometry guy 21:23, 9 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually, GG, there's been a further deterioration since I posted the request to delist, and there's clear consensus on this page that it shouldn't have GA status. SlimVirgin  talk  contribs 03:22, 10 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment. I agree with G-guy. The article has improved and this GAR should be closed as "no action."  That's my $0.02.  Bill the Cat 7 (talk) 21:32, 9 May 2010 (UTC)