Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Islam-related articles

The purpose of this supplementary manual is to create guidelines for editing Islam-related articles to conform to a neutral encyclopedic style, as well as to make articles easy to read by following a consistent format. The following rules do not claim to be the last word. One way is often as good as another, but if everyone does it the same way, Wikipedia will be easier to read and use, not to mention easier to write and edit; it will also minimize unnecessary disputes and disagreements. This manual is open to all proposals, discussion, and editing.

There is considerable disagreement among the editors of Islam-related articles about which sources are reliable. The most important thing to remember is that all sources and articles must conform to Wikipedia policies such as WP:NOR, WP:V. and WP:NPOV.

General form of articles
Islam-related articles should generally satisfy the following:


 * In general, the first sentence of each article should have the article title in bold and then define the article title.
 * Each article should proceed with general remarks near the start and specific ones later. In lengthy articles, separate pages for detailed discussions of a topic should be used with a main article link (or links).
 * At the end of each article, there should be the sections 'See also' (for closely related articles), 'References' (for reliability of article content), and 'External links' (for links to relevant web pages), in that order.
 * Each article should be in at least one Islam category.

Arabic transliteration
As a general rule, diacritical marks over and under the letters should not be used in article titles or text (only in the etymology section and sometimes the first sentence of the lead section). If a non-standard form of transliteration is to be used, it must be the common transcription, based on references or self-identification. For example, Mecca rather than Makkah, mosque rather than masjid, etc. Otherwise, a basic transcription should be used. The characters representing the ayin (ع) and the hamza (ء) are not omitted (except when at the start of a word) in the basic form, both represented by the straight apostrophe (').

Words of Arabic origin should be written out in lower case, except at the beginning of a sentence, and italicized, except when the word has passed into common English vocabulary (see Manual of Style). For example, fiqh, kharaj, and wudu should usually be italicized; jihad and hadith should not. Proper names are exempt from these rules: they should always be capitalized but never italicized.

Articles should include the original Arabic and its strict transliteration on the first line. If you do not know the Arabic, place Arabic script needed at the top of the talk page to mark the article for attention from someone who does.

Translation
Arabic terms should be translated into standard English wherever possible without compromising the meaning of the text. For example, "Allah" should be translated as "God". However, there are cases when translation is discouraged when it would risk obscuring the special meaning of this term as used in Islamic literature. For instance, a literal translation of "Deen" as "path" would be suboptimal; "way of life" might be a better option.

Templates
Various templates useful when editing Islam-related articles can be found at Manual of Style/Islam-related articles/Templates; for other templates please see Template index.

Islamic honorifics
In keeping with the neutral nature of Wikipedia, Islamic honorifics should generally be omitted from articles (whether Arabic or English), except where they are part of quotations or images.

Images containing Islamic honorifics or calligraphy should have a well-documented usage outside of Wikipedia and not be user-generated.

Allah
"Allah" should be replaced with its translation, "God", unless used as part of an English-language quote. The first occurrence of "God" in the article should be something to the effect of the following: God.

When referencing a deity by a personal pronoun (e.g. "he" or "his"), the pronoun should not be capitalized except as demanded by standard grammar (i.e. at the beginning of a sentence, but not in the middle of one). Refer to the Manual of Style's section on capital letters.

Allah has many honorifics, the most common being


 * SWT or the fuller ', meaning "praised and exalted is He (Allah)"—recommended action is to remove'.

Quran

 * Holy Quran (or Holy Qur'an, Holy Koran, etc.)—recommended action is to NPOV to "Quran". Reason: Calling a book "Holy" is making a value judgment that is inappropriate to Wikipedia. An exception is where referring to a translation that has a value judgment in its title.

Muhammad
Honorifics for Muhammad should generally not be used in articles. The Salawat article discusses these honorifics in more detail, the most common ones being:
 * The Prophet or (The) Holy Prophet (including with a lowercase 'h') in place of, or preceding, "Muhammad"; or just Prophet preceding "Muhammad"—recommended action is to simplify and NPOV to just "Muhammad" except when it is the first reference in an article, or the first reference in the lead, in which case it may be rendered as "the Islamic prophet Muhammad" if necessary.
 * PBUH, or the fuller "peace be upon him" (and the Arabic equivalents), after Muhammad or other Islamic prophets—recommended action is to remove.
 * SAW, SAWW, saws, SM or the fuller version ', variants of PBUH, sometimes used after "Muhammad"—recommended action is to remove'.
 * ﷺ (Unicode U+FDFA) Arabic ligature for —recommended action is to remove.

Angels and prophets
An angel or a prophet has the honorific:


 * AS or the fuller ', for example, Jesus (AS)—recommended action is to remove'.

Companions
Capitalization of "Companions of Muhammad" when referring to those who knew Muhammad (the Sahaba)—corrective action is to write in lowercase in keeping with Manual of Style.

There are also other honorifics for companions all of which can be abbreviated to:


 * RA or the fuller versions ' (')–for a, a , or plural –recommended action is to remove.

Other persons
Honorifics may also include:


 * RU or the fuller version '–for highly recognized Islamic scholars—recommended action is to remove'.
 * Hadrat, Hadhrat, Hazret, or Hazrat, similar to the English "His Honor" or "His Majesty"—recommended action is to remove.
 * Hazretleri, an honorific sometimes appearing after the names of respected Muslim personalities, such as imams–recommended action is to remove.
 * Hujja, Hujjat al-Islam, or Hujjat Allah, honorific title meaning "proof of Islam" or "proof of God"—recommended action is to remove.

Words to watch
The use of the word terrorism can be contentious; see words that may introduce bias. Its use should be decided on a case-by-case basis.

Categorisation
Due to the huge number of Islam articles present, as well as to address the problem of 'dumping' new Islam articles in Category:Islam (and similarly for other subcategories), appropriate placement of articles in categories is required. This has been done to some extent, but quite often new editors are unaware of more technical categories (e.g. Category:Quranic exegesis). Of course an article may be (and usually is) placed in more than one category, but to avoid cluttering categories the number of categories any given article is placed into should be kept to a minimum.

Islam category
With respect to the 'dumping' problem mentioned above, it is requested that editors check Category:Islam frequently, as this is the place where many new Islam articles are placed, but where the articles could (sometimes clearly) be better placed in at least one subcategory of Category:Islam. Currently, there are a handful of articles on the Islam category page.

Criteria that should be satisfied for inclusion of an Islam-related article in the Islam category are:


 * Articles that are clearly representative of a major and well known aspect of Islam, such as Allah, Quran and Muhammad.
 * Articles that don't satisfy the above criterion and cannot at present be satisfactorily placed in a subcategory of the Islam category (sort of like a 'holding area').

Divisions of Islam
There is a Category:Islamic branches for placing articles on various sects in Islam.

Sunni, Shi'a, Sufi, and Ahmadiyya Islam
These four sects have their own categories, in fact they are subcategories of Category:Islamic branches, which is a subcategory of Category:Islam.

People
There are many Islam articles that are about Muslims. These articles should be placed in the appropriate category such as Category:Muslims or a subcategory thereof such as, Category:Caliphs, Category:Imams and Category:Muslims by nationality. Only the most notable or famous Muslims should be placed in Category:Muslims.

Stubs
There is currently one stub category with 9 subcategories:


 * Category:Islam stubs – add Islam-stub near the end of an article to add it to this category.
 * Category:Ahmadiyya stubs
 * Category:Islamic biography stubs – add Islam-bio-stub near the end of an article to add it to this subcategory.
 * Category:Islam by country stubs
 * Category:Islamic studies book stubs
 * Category:Mosque stubs
 * Category:Islamic organization stubs
 * Category:Quran stubs
 * Category:Shia Islam stubs‎
 * Category:Sufism stubs‎

Articles lacking references
Articles that have no references at the end of an article should have the Unreferenced tag at the top of the article.

Even with references at the end, certain statements in the main text of the article may still be unsubstantiated, in which case the Citation needed tag should be placed immediately after the claim.

References within main text
Apart from the parenthetical referencing convention of writing the author's name and year of publication of source in brackets after the end of a sentence or paragraph, more specific citations for WikiProject Islam include the following:

Quran translations
There is no general consensus on which translation is to be used for Islam articles at Wikipedia. However, in any given article, any translation(s) from the Quran should quote the same translation source (e.g. Yusuf Ali) in that article (but not necessarily this same source in another article), unless comparing different translations or giving evidence for the meaning of a certain verse.

It is recommended that template and  be used to quote verses from the Quran, which will provide an inline-superscripted link to quran.com or the USC-MSA online translations of Yusuf Ali, Pickthall, Mustafa Khattab and Shakir. Other translators can also be referenced using the template.

Quran and Hadith
The Quran and the Hadith are considered to be primary sources, as defined in WP:PRIMARY. Therefore, they should not be quoted to make an argument or imply a particular interpretation unless one can also cite a reliable secondary source that supports that usage. Primary sources may only be used on Wikipedia to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the source but without further, specialized knowledge. But it's a good idea to quote the Quran and Hadith to explain a topic, if they are cited in reliable secondary sources. For articles and sections where only Quran and Hadith are cited without secondary sources, use the templates Primary sources or Religious text primary, or inline tag Primary source inline.

Religious sources
In Islamic branches with organized academies or recognized theological experts in religious doctrine and scholarship, the proceedings of official religious bodies and the journals or publications of recognized and well-regarded religious academies and experts can be considered reliable sources for religious doctrine and views where such views represent significant viewpoints on an article subject. Ordination alone does not generally ensure religious expertise or reliability. Absent evidence of stature or a reputation for expertise in a leading, important religious denomination or community, the view of an individual minister or theologian is ordinarily not reliable for representing religious views.

Secondary sources are not necessarily from recent years – or even centuries. The sacred or original text(s) of the religion will always be primary sources, but any other acceptable source may be a secondary source in some articles. For example, the works of Al-Ghazali are secondary sources for an Asharite perspective on many topics, but are primary sources for the Al-Ghazali article.

References at end of article
References at the end include books, journals and many other types of sources. The citation templates for these are suggested for use.

Images
See also Talk:Muhammad/images