Wikipedia:WikiProject Islam:The Muslim Guild/User comments/Striver/4

''This is a subpage to Wikipedia:WikiProject Islam:The Muslim Guild/User comments/Striver

Zora: This does relate to articles, but it relates to lots of them. Striver keeps PUSHING to insert more and more Shi'a-POV material as fact in a number of central articles. He has turned the Ali article into a piece of Ali-worship, full of quotes about how wonderful Ali was. He is trying to put a section re the disputed hadith of Gadir Khum in the Hadith article. He feels that it's necessary to quote Ali in the Tawhid article, as if Ali were an authority on a level with Muhammad and the Qur'an. He is reverting to a munged version of Muhammad ibn Abu Bakr, in which he takes my restatement of Madelung and represents it as a quote from Madelung. He is inserting sneering POV quotes from long-deceased Western historians into the Umar article. He set up an article (The meaning of the Holy Qur'an) just to contain three links, and then linked to the article from the Umar article (that's not Shi'a-POV, that's just ... nuts). I assume that some of you are Sunni and would dislike this strident attempt to turn Wikipedia into Shi'apedia. Heck, just look at the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Islam:The Shia Guild page. Besides inserting Shi'a-POV into main articles, he's planning a complete set of "Shi'a view of ..." articles. POV forks are deprecated on Wikipedia, and I can't believe that everyone else is letting him do this. I keep trying not to care when he munges the Islam-related articles, and I keep caring. Do any of the rest of you care? If not, perhaps I should just let Striver go until he does something so egregious that he's banned. Zora 05:23, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

Striver: Great, now maybe we can deal with this?

Here is a record of me trying to contact Zora, and Zora refusing to do so :.

So, lets list her complains:


 * ''Striver keeps PUSHING to insert more and more Shi'a-POV material as fact in a number of central articles.

In some occasions i have added material the PRESENTS shia pov. But i have not pushed to add Shia pov material. Let me give a example:

"Ali was born in the Kaaba" is "Shia pov"

"Shia belive Ali was born in the Kaaba" is "a representation of Shia pov"

"Shia pov" goes against WP rules. I know that. Zora knows that. "representation of Shia pov" complies with wiki rules, and in fact, WP encourages that, ie to represent a issue from multiple povs.


 * 'Striver sees it as very bad faith from Zora to be accused of "Keeping to push Shia-POV material as fact"


 * ''He has turned the Ali article into a piece of Ali-worship, full of quotes about how wonderful Ali was.

Yes. What is wrong with that? He was wonderfull, and everyone agrees. And that needs to be represented. I did not put in all the non-Muslim quotes, but i do intent to keep zora from deleting it. It is higly relevant that manny non-muslims have praised him high, and it needs to be represented.

Here is the quotes she is refering to:

As can be seen, the references are from quite prominent sources:


 * Simon Ockley
 * William Muir
 * Philip Khuri Hitti
 * Edward Gibbon


 * 'Striver sees no problem in representing the majority of the non-muslim view of Ali"

Further, one of the quotes is made to prove that Ali being born in the Kaaba is not a Shia only view, it is also shared by some western scholars, which of course, came to that conclusion after reading Sunni sources. How much Shia book do you think Simon Ockley read in 1894?

And above all, it was not me adding that phrase in the first place, it was a admin that added it after a LONG conversation with me. I later added that "some sunnis" also belive so, if i recall corectly, after someone else took the initiative, but got reverted.


 * 'Striver belives it apropiate to point out that even famous non-muslim scholars agree to a point, when manny have a hard time beliving in it"


 * ''He is trying to put a section re the disputed hadith of Gadir Khum in the Hadith article.

Yes, what about it? It is not the dispute regarding its interpretation that i want to represent there, rather the fact that it is the most reported event in the history of Islam. And that definitly haves a place in the hadith article.


 * ''He feels that it's necessary to quote Ali in the Tawhid article, as if Ali were an authority on a level with Muhammad and the Qur'an.

I made no such claim. Zora is puting words in my moth. The Muslim guild have a request to expand on the topic, made by JuanMuslim, and so does the talk page of tawheed If you look at the tawheed talk page, JuanMuslim is actualy DEMANDIN more hadith quotes, and that is exactly what i did, i quoted on of the most famous hadith regarding tawheed, from one of the most famous books. The book happens to be Shia, but so what, since when does that matter? Sunni agree to the content of the hadith, so it comming from a Shia collection should not matter. It certancly does not matter when Bukhari is quoted on subjects that Shia agree on, so i dont see why Nahj should be a problem on subjects Sunni agree on. Unless the problem is that Zora cant stand to see Nahj in that article, it ruins her sens of balance ... naaaw.... Why does it not ruin her sense of balance when there is no Shia books or references on other topics? And i did point out that she is welcomed to quotes from the other caliphs if she feels it to be necesary for the point of balance, but she did not. Actualy, JuanMuslim did quote a Abu Bakr hadith, but neither wanted to add it to the article.

FACTS: there was 2 request to expand the article, one request to do so with hadith. I did that. However, Zora haves a problem since i choose Nahj. I can beet you my car (that i dont have) that she would not have complained if i hade choosen a Umar quoted from Bukhari. FACT: Sunnis agree to the content of the hadith choosen, and it is a famous hadith.

Further, Nahj is actualy taght amoun Sunnis as well, for educational purpose:


 * ''I remember, for example, when our Arabic Rhetoric teacher was teaching the Shaqshaqiyyah oration from the book "Nahj al-Balaghah" by Imam Ali, that I was puzzled, as were many other students, when we read it, but I dared to ask the following question: "Are these truly the words of Imam Ali?" He answered: "Definitely, who would have had this eloquence apart from him. If it were not his saying, why should the Muslim scholars like Shaykh Muhammad Abduh, the Mufti of Egypt, concern themselves with its interpretation?" Then I said, "Imam Ali accuses Abu Bakr and Umar that they robbed him of his right to succeed as Caliph".


 * ''The teacher was outraged and he rebuked me very strongly and threatened to expel me from the class, and added, "We teach Arabic Rhetoric and not history. We are not concerned with the dark episodes of history and its bloody wars between Muslims, and in as much as Allah has cleaned our swords from their blood, let us clean our tongues by not condemning them".

http://www.al-islam.org/guided/8.html


 * 'Striver accuses Zora of falsly accusing Striver of being biased in this particular issue"


 * ''He is reverting to a munged version of Muhammad ibn Abu Bakr, in which he takes my restatement of Madelung and represents it as a quote from Madelung.

Yes, and that was fixed after you pointed out it out to me. As can be seen, i have not deleted any of here material, but she insist on deleting my material. She accused the Uthman letter to come from a Shia site, even though it clearly says "sunni site". She stoped arguing about it, but keept on deleting it! That behavior is representative of her, she can only tolerate sources she trust, everything else is Shia pov, even if its from a Sunni site. If she is beaten by eviden she will ignore that there was a dialog regarding the issue and continue to delet it, including it in the bunch she calls "shia pov presented as facts"

I did signal that i wanted to cooperate with her, in words like "I hope we are closing on a agreed version *smile*" and hade extensive talk with her on the talk page, but she only accepts what she accepts and blindly dissmises the rest of it as Shia pov. She still refuses to add the leter to uthman, only agreeing to quote madelung.

Also, she did not let me add that he had a son that would be the grandfather of Jafar al-sidiq, claiming that there was no such linkage known to her. Whell, there would be if she had taken the time to follow the genreations. But even though i explained it to her, she still want to remore the mentioning of him: Her latest reversal, ommiting both him having a son, even though i mentioned his high relevance, and also the letter, even though i proved it was no shia pov, as she claimed:


 * 'Striver accuses Zora of reverting blindly after having been proven wrong"


 * ''He is inserting sneering POV quotes from long-deceased Western historians into the Umar article.

Yes, and we hade a good discusion about it, and she did not reply in the end:

I quote myself:


 * ''It is of intrest that the book is published in 1905. However, even if his work is questionable, it is of value to show that there are/wher western scholars holding that view. In essence, if Umar hade made any great dead that where easy confirmable or widely reported or significant, surely nobody would have wrote the thing that Margouliouth wrote. So in that view, it is of intrest to have his view cited, not so much to prove it as a fact, rather that it possible to have a educated view of Umar and not find any heroic act.


 * ''Regarding puting the Margoliouth quote in my "pet article", since "It does not represent the majority academic view of Umar by any means", i would like to have that proven. Bring me three western scholar in Islam that belives Umar is valiant, and refers to some incident to prove that, and i will agree that the Margoliouth quote is not representative and i will remove it. Be adviced that it is writen "SOME western scholars", not all of them. So bring me three that belive he was valiant and i will remove "some" and move the quote to my "pet" article. The burden of evidence is upon you.

She did nothing to prove that the Margoliouth pov representing "some" of the scholars is wrong, however, she insited on removing it anyway. And now she comes here to complain instead of proving the statment that "some" western scholars share the shia view of Umar.


 * 'Striver accuses Zora of reverting blindly after having been proven wrong, again"


 * ''He set up an article (The meaning of the Holy Qur'an) just to contain three links, and then linked to the article from the Umar article (that's not Shi'a-POV, that's just ... nuts).

[The meaning of the Holy Qur'an]] is a book, and it deserves a article. It is strange that she thinks this is ok:

"Madelung, 1997, pp. 138-39"

but this is "nuts":

The meaning of the Holy Qur'an

They both take the same amount of space, but mine has a link to the book, and also to a external version of the quote. one can also easly find the year and author by looking at the book.


 * 'Striver dont get why that is 'nuts'"


 * ''I assume that some of you are Sunni and would dislike this strident attempt to turn Wikipedia into Shi'apedia. Heck, just look at the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Islam:The Shia Guild page. Besides inserting Shi'a-POV into main articles, he's planning a complete set of "Shi'a view of ..." articles.

She is opposing having "Shia view of" article, and in the same time advocates removal of Shia pov representation from the main page? Do i need to say more?


 * 'Striver is evaluating how 'nuts' should be applied"


 * ''POV forks are deprecated on Wikipedia, and I can't believe that everyone else is letting him do this.

Id she would remeber, we had that discussion here:

Articles_for_deletion/Shia_view_of_Umar_ibn_al-Khattab

Surpisingly (not), it is Zora that nominated it for deletion. Here is one comment from there:

''I dont get you folks. First we had a Shia version of him on the main page, but that could not be tolerated, so we moved it to its own article. Now you want to delet it to? --Striver

''It does seem that Zora, having tried to keep most of the Shia material from the main article, is now trying to delete the separate article that was created in response. --Mel Etitis

''If Christian views of slavery is legit, why is Shia view of Umar ibn al-Khattab not legit`?

''*Jewish view of Jesus ''*Christian views of Jesus ''*Mormon view of Jesus ''*New Testament view on Jesus' life

''Self evident ?

''This findings just increased my anger towards Zora. --Striver

''Hmm, interesting point. I'd personally be inclined to delete all of the above, but that does set a precedent for "X views on...", which is my biggest objection. (change vote to) Abstain. - Mustafaa

Keep. Create Sunni view of Umar ibn al-Khattab. Create pages for any other group that has a view. It's only our Westocentrism that allows us to feel Jewish views of Jesus is any more or less acceptable. ... Also feel that Zora should be admonished to remember to step back from eir personal religious beliefs and allow the Umar article to be edited in an NPOV fashion. Grace Note


 * 'Striver is tempted to say degrading things to Zora"


 * ''I keep trying not to care when he munges the Islam-related articles, and I keep caring. Do any of the rest of you care? If not, perhaps I should just let Striver go until he does something so egregious that he's banned. Zora 05:23, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

Waiting for comments...

--Striver 14:42, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

Back to Wikipedia:WikiProject Islam:The Muslim Guild/User comments/Striver.