Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Judaism/Archive 12

Aqdamuth / אקדמות
For the Ashkenazim in the house, perhaps an article on Aqdamuth (please don't put it at Akdammes or something scary) might be a good project for tonight and tomorrow... :-) חג שמח!  Tom e rtalk  03:26, 1 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Probably not this year. It would require some research; I don't have a copy of the ArtScroll translation. I presume the Jewish Encyclopedia has an article that we can use, as long as the remove the quasi-scholary waffle for which it is known. JFW | T@lk  13:22, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Help develop Scripture Database website
I've been conceptualizing a Scripture Database website for several years now. I've finally gotten around to publishing a rough draft of the site online. It is wiki-based and would make a good compliment to Wikipedia scripture pages. Please use my dedicated talk page to discuss. --J. J. 19:36, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Fornication
I've been writing the article on Fornication, and I'm very interested to find out about the Jewish perspective, which I've left space for. Is it possible for someone here to write a pargraph or two? A J Hay 07:36, 6 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Here is an attempt for others here to comment on:


 * Orthodox Judaism restricts sexual activity to marriage between a Jewish man and a Jewish woman. A man and women are prohibited from being in a closed room alone together if they are not married, a practice called yichud.


 * Sexual relations between a man and a woman who are not married are considered less serious than the Biblically prohibited unions, specifically adultery (a married woman having relations with another man) and incest; the later have more severe penalties and there are serious restrictions on children of prohibited unions (mamzerim).


 * Sexual relations is one of the ways the Talmud (Kiddushin 1) specifies for effecting a marriage, though this method is frowned upon by the Rabbis. Children of a Jewish woman are considered Jewish regardless of whether she was married.
 * --agr 14:14, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

See negiah. Covers it all. No need to mention everything else. Fornication is prohibited under any context except between man and wife when the woman is not niddah (state of seperation brought on by the monthly cycle). Physical context between close relatives is permissible, although not in a sensual way. JFW | T@lk  15:16, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Thankyou kindly, I have posted what's written here on the article, with see also:negiah. Feel free to edit the article itself at any time. A J Hay 13:22, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Israeli Rabbinate's Decision Not to Accept Rabbinical Council of America Conversions
I've attempted to add material on this decision into the Who is a Jew article. I think it's a momentous event -- the rupture creates a de facto denominational split between Haredi and Modern Orthodox Jews and means that a large number of North American Orthodox converts and their descendents won't be recognized as Jews in Israel. Perhaps should be mentioned and flagged as a current event in other articles as well. See [] --Shirahadasha 13:01, 7 June 2006 (UTC)


 * The London Beth Din and various other European battei din have been skeptical about certain Israeli conversions for decades. Why was that not a "denominational split"? JFW | T@lk  14:43, 7 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Seems more like Israeli bureaucracy to me. This is just like last year when Israel stopped (for a short time) recognizing YU degrees.  It does not seem to be a religious issue.  I am sure that there are many haradi rabbi who would recommend that the couple marry abroad to avoid this nonsense (just like many secular people, who are really forbidden to get married according to halakha, do).  Just the fact that the child of the convert had a letter from a prominent rabbi who did appear on the Chief Rabbinate's list, (certifying that the mother's conversion had met the highest standards of rabbinic law), and they still didn’t accept it show that there is bureaucratic, not halakhic thinking at work.  Jon513 17:49, 7 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Does Shira enjoy Haredi bashing? IZAK 08:06, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
 * IZAK, please assume good faith. This seemed to me like a legitimate question, especially coming from a perspective of someone who is not Haredi and disagrees with many Haredi concepts. JFW | T@lk  08:37, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
 * JFW: I would normally agree, but when someone has consistently edited and introduced articles from the far-left spectrum of Modern Orthodox Judaism (some may even regard it as the "lunatic fringe" of Modern Orthodoxy), often bordering on original research and not far off from the proverbial "soapbox", so that then subsequent question/s come across as very tendentious, provocative, and desigend to cause guaranteed controversy. In this instance, for example, it would be enough to report recent news from the Israeli chief rabbinate (actually it was more of a deliberately aimed probe by a secular Israeli newspaper which goaded the Sephardic Chief Rabbi to make some comments and then the papers turned it into "hot news", when some of these policies have been in effect for some time.) When dealing with matters of religion in general, one needs to avoid any appearance of mudraking or unfounded sensationalism, especially, as it may come across as yet another attempt to paint the Haredim "blacker than black" or the Modern Orthodox as "more modern than ever". This is a very delicate subject and should be handled with kid gloves IZAK 09:29, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I do agree that not all Shira's contributions have treated Haredim fairly, nor can I see how modifying halakha for political aims will gives us a better Judaism than the one we had before. JFW | T@lk  10:05, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Another serious error that Shira is making, is the assumption that the Israeli chief rabbinate is part of Haredi Judaism when that is far from true. Historically, Batei Din under Haredi auspices, anywhere in the world, have never automatically accepted conversions done by Modern Orthodox rabbis and have usually required a second conversion according to their own standards, so that is not news at all it's part of a reality that has always existed. On the other hand, the Israeli chief rabbinate is a political and religious hybrid creation of Zionism wishing to mesh with Judaism. It functions in tandem with the political State of Israel in conjunction with the entrenched Religious Zionist establishment in Israel. While in office, any Israeli chief rabbi represents the entire secular State of Israel and he neither represents nor speaks for any branch of Haredim. So Shira's assumptions are simply not correct, even though there is an impression in the secular and Modern Orthodox world that somehow or other the Haredim "control" the chief rabbinate. While people like Rav Eliashiv may have some input, because he was once a dayan in the chief rabbinate himself, yet the fact is that the Haredi rabbonim, rosh yeshivas, and rebbes, have quite openly and publicly long stressed that the Israeli chief rabbinate does not speak for them, rather they have their own organizations, parties, and Batei Din or essentially accept their Edah HaCharedis. The official Israeli chief rabbinate is essentially connected to the Religious Zionist Movement and it is they who are not comfortable with the leftward drift of the Modern Orthodox rabbinate as represented, for example, by the Rabbinical Council of America and its mostly Modern Orthodox rabbis with their more lenient conversion standards. It just so happens to be that many ardently religious Zionist rabbis in Israel have a greater respect for Israel's Haredi rabbis, a feature of Israeli Orthodox life that the Modern Orthodox rabbis dislike since many of them would rather see a rapprochement with the non-Orthodox branches of Judaism instead and they are angry when they see their Religious Zionist allies in Israel go in the opposite direction by alligning themselves with Haredi policy positions. So let's be careful about oversimplifying things or twisting the true story to fit a preconceived POV agenda. IZAK 23:14, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I understand that the move could be interpreted as bureaucratic. Perhaps the Rabbinate is simply extending its general standard prohibiting ordinary congregational rabbis from performing conversions and requiring them to be centralized to rabbis of Rabbinical courts, and imposing it on a diaspora environment used to doing things differently. Perhaps the issue can be resolved. The difficulty is that the Rabbinate's judgments in this area are de facto religious in nature, whether or not so intended.--Shirahadasha 23:17, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
 * I don't want to get myself embroiled in this imbroglio, especially not since all I really "know" amounts to nothing more than unsubstantiated hearsay bordering on gossip...but from what I've read, the entire fracas has nothing to do with orthodox vs. non-orthodox, but is rather a result of a backlash from the leadership of the rabanuth against the OU because the OU condemned one of the rabanuth's "native sons" who was convicted of child molestation, a move which the rabanuth took as an egregious offense. This explanation seems to hold a great deal of water, since the giyurim in question are across the board, giving recognition to only a few "favorites" on an age-old list, which has, from what I've read, been altered to omit certain rabanim who were formerly in its good graces, specifically because they supported the OU's condemnation of said individual.  All of this pontification about the leftward drift of modoxy and castigation of shira chadasha for her ... ahem ... views, is therefore, utterly irrelevant to the subject at hand, and NONE of this discussion is doing anything to actually promote the betterment of WP.  Tom e rtalk  06:21, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Mezuzah
I expanded Mezuzah significantly... Any comments on the additions? Karimarie 22:16, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Latest in biblical terminology
Since this project seems to be more active, I thought I'd point out my new comment Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Countering systemic bias in religion concerning specifically this project's Usage of words such as "Old Testament" and "New Testament" in articles. --J. J. 15:42, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Project page edit war
and seem to think the WikiProject page is unnecessarily biased. Kindly review the edit history and comment on their edits. FairNBalanced is warmly welcomed as a member of the WikiProject. JFW | T@lk  20:33, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I've moved commentary from my and Jfdwolff's talk pages here, where we can continue the discussion:

Timothy, I disagree with your changes to WikiProject Judaism, and have reverted them. Primarily, you removed the vitally important paragraph warning WikiProject members to monitor for NPOV in Biblical articles. Furthermore, your edits appear meddlesome considering you have not registered as a member of the WikiProject, nor attempted to conduct any form of discussion on the WikiProject's talkpage. JFW | T@lk  11:05, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Your "vitally important paragraph" is precisely what never under any circumstances should have been restored. I've replied on your talk page.Timothy Usher 11:17, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Jfdwolff, it is simply inappropriate to summarize your recent edit to WikiProject Judaism as "meddling by user who is not a member of the WikiProject." Moreover, the passages you'd restored are themselves inappropriate. We're not here to band together in factions against perceived rivals, or to spread negative feelings or assumptions about editors with other religious beliefs, and if we are, we shouldn't be here.Timothy Usher 11:15, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

If you are uncomfortable with the phrasing on that page, you are encouraged to discuss this on the talkpage first. Do not make your edits again without appropriate discussion, for reasons of WP:POINT. JFW | T@lk  11:21, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

The vitally important paragraph addressed the important point that Biblical articles frequently do not adequately represent the Jewish view. This is a function of WP:NPOV, and you should not be removing that paragraph. JFW | T@lk  11:22, 11 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Can you explain to me the need for “Jewish vs. Christian perspectives?


 * Can you explain how you are assuming good faith when you write, “Being on the lookout when certain "Biblical" articles are written with clear subtle and not-so-subtle anti-Semitic intent...”?


 * By the way, it's absurd that you cite WP:NPOV to justify material warning Project members that Christians are out to get them.


 * I await your response.Timothy Usher 11:28, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Whether you are right or wrong, the text on the WikiProject page is consensus of the project members. I cannot disagree that allegations of anti-Semitism should be revised to reflect WP:AGF (I didn't write that text). But deleting them outright is equally WP:POINT. Because contrary to your apparent perception there have been numerous anti-Jewish editors on Wikipedia, some of which have been running rampant for quite some time. JFW | T@lk  11:44, 11 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm totally aware of that. That doesn't justify gearing up Project members to expect fights.  That's unduly and unproductively contentious.  A look at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Islam and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Islam:The Muslim Guild should enlighten you as to the reasons these changes are necessary.


 * I'm glad we can at least agree that there is a problem with this text. We also shouldn't be soliciting changes to or "defense of" particular articles.  I invite you to change the language so as to conform to policy and good judgement.


 * As for WP:POINT, all I can suggest is, re-read.Timothy Usher 11:54, 11 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm going to agree with JFW on this one. I don't think there was anything to suggest that the text indicated that chrisitans were "out to get them", there was nothing innappropriate about what was written, if something offended you I would prefer you use the talk page.- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 19:46, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
 * It's not about me being offended. Where these content disputes are concerned, I'm rather inclined to assume that the problem is very real, and that the posts were made in good faith.  It's more of a general point about how these projects should work, and, no, I don't have to join the project to notice this.  In fact, an outside view may be precisely what is needed, and I encourage you to seek opinions from others.  Please consider if there might be some way to preserve most of this text while addressing my objections.Timothy Usher 19:56, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Your concerns have been noted. That fact does not give you permission to significantly alter the text of the project page unilaterally. If you think something should be changed, you should address it on the talk page. Kari Hazzard  ( talk  |  contrib )
 * I was given permission to edit pages, including this project page, when I logged on. We were discussing it last night on my user talk page, and now I've moved the thread here.  Have you any further concerns I can address?Timothy Usher 22:56, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
 * And we were given the permission to revert edits that are considered incorrect by most of the editors of an article. As the article reflects the consensus of the project members it currently stands 75 to 2 in favor of the version of the article before your edits. You've yet to make a compelling argument in favor of your own edits. What do you propose as a modified version of the text? Kari Hazzard  ( talk  |  contrib ) 23:11, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Recent changes

 * I’d changed the section title “Jewish vs. Christian perspectives” to “Jewish and Christian perspectives.”  My aim was to tone down the atmosphere of conflict, but lookng at it again, I can see that "and" might be construed as altering the meaning in a way I hadn’t intended by suggesting that these perspectives must be the same.  We also shouldn't be suggesting that there are two monolithic and opposed "Jewish" and "Christian" perspective.  I suggest "Common differences between Jewish and Christian perspectives".


 * I rewrote "Jews do not share this belief, and many find its usage offensive, as it implies the reader also worships Jesus as god and messiah. Therefore it is preferable and in accord with NPOV policy to refer to "Jesus of Nazareth" or simply “Jesus”” to “This usage violates wikipedia policy, and it never hurts to remind editors to refer to him as "Jesus of Nazareth" or simply "Jesus.""


 * We should not be saying “Jesus Christ” on wikipedia, or, for that matter, on talk pages. It’s POV, and it’d divisive.  On that, we can all agree.  However, we shouldn’t be encouraging members to take offense.  Most instances are probably good faith additions by over-zealous editors.  Just remove "Christ" and remind other editors of policy.


 * Just as a note, I specifically use the term “Christ” on the talk pages of Talk:Messianic Judaism, as I feel that is one of the strongest agrguments that the aforementioned is a form of “Christ”ianity and not Judaism. The term means messiah in Greek; thus those who believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the messiah ipso facto believe that he is a “Christ” and are thus Christians. Removing the term destroys the argument. -- Avi 00:31, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, sure, of course. Where it's on topic, as in "Christians believe Jesus to be the Messiah, and thus refer to him as Jesus Christ." (from Christianity).  Perhaps a qualification of the statment above (in either version) is warranted.Timothy Usher 07:28, 12 June 2006 (UTC)


 * The paragraph I'd removed: "Being on the lookout when certain "Biblical" articles are written with clear subtle and not-so-subtle anti-Semitic intent, such as Verses criticizing Jews in the Old Testament. Need to respond, dispute, correct, and establish a true NPOV."


 * It’s a misuse of project space to solicit involvement in particular articles along a pre-determined point of view, regardless of the merits of that point of view. In any case, the article appears headed for a well-deserved deletion.  Once it's gone, all that remains is a warning that anti-Semites are out to twist articles related to the Tanakh.  Even if true, it’s a violation of WP:AGF which encourages members to do the same.  This is the wrong way to approach Wikipedia.


 * I'm inclined to join the project myself once these problems are adequately addressed. Timothy Usher 23:27, 11 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I do not support your renaming of the section. It intends to contrast the Jewish and Christian view, and use of vs is justified.
 * I do support your rephrasing of the paragraph on the naming of Jesus. To imply that he was "the Christ" is POV by definition and should be avoided outside direct quotes.
 * I do not agree that a WikiProject is not allowed to advance one POV over another. This project is made up out of editors with a close knowledge of Judaism, who are hence better equipped to supply the Jewish POV, especially where this is felt to be underrepresented. If the text of that paragraph seems to assume bad faith, it should be changed and not deleted. A casual look at WikiProject Countering systemic bias will show you all you need to know. The article you were referring to is Verses in the Old Testament criticizing apostates, no doubt. JFW | T@lk  07:25, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's the miserable article which must be deleted to which I'd referred. The old name as posted here redirected to it.


 * "I do not agree that a WikiProject is not allowed to advance one POV over another."


 * This is a real mistake. Factions and solicitations are not widely appreciated.


 * Moreover, there is no single "Jewish POV", as anyone who follows the incessant Israel-Palestine debates is well aware. I suppose one could say that Jesus not being the messiah is the Jewish POV, but only by no true Scotsman.  We're not here to determine the "Jewish POV", much less to act as a unit to apply it.  Trust me, this is not the first WikiProject to which I've presented this news.  See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Islam:The Muslim Guild, where members are called to band together to fight "Jewish and Christian authors with axes to grind," and much more.


 * Contrasting the Jewish and Christian points of view is itself somewhat inappropriate. Let editors, Jewish and Christian (and otherwise) alike, come to their own conclusions through discussions on the relevant talk pages.  This should be a place for editors interested in Judaism-related articles, as am I.


 * WikiProject Countering systemic bias has no special status in policy. It's just another project page someone wrote up as we're doing here.


 * I'm glad we've some agreement on the "Christ" paragraph at least. We're not disagreeing on the substance here, more just the tone.Timothy Usher 07:48, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Update I've rewritten the "Be on the lookout..." section to read, "Sometimes articles related to the Tanakh, or "Old Testament", are written from a distinctly Christian perspective. It's a worthy goal to ensure that Jewish perspectives are taken into account." I still don't agree this is the right way to approach wikipedia, but this is at least less overtly paranoid.Timothy Usher 07:59, 12 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Timothy, for someone so careful about trying to avoid conflit, you do a great job of starting one. Jon513 12:53, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, someone has to do it. It seems that these violations of WP policy (and more importantly, spirit) have gone on so long that some have come to view them as the natural state of affairs: they are not.  The proper purpose of this project can only be for a place for editors interested in Judaism-related articles to discuss general issues of style, common problems, etc.  I think we'd all agree at least that to maintain this pretense is desirable.Timothy Usher 19:11, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Having made all those changes, will you now stop making a fuss? How on earth did you come to the conclusion that your edits are supported by consensus? Why is it so hard for you to propose new versions here first and discuss them in a collaborative fashion?

Timothy, it seems you have finally joined the WikiProject; what do you have to contribute to articles about Judaism? JFW | T@lk  20:54, 12 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, I don't know, I just arrived here. So far, my only contribution has been to defend the Passover article when it was on the front page over Passover.  I've been active in other religious articles, mostly Islam-related, also Christianity, and God.  Also, I've been involved in articles related to Jewish ethnicity (e.g. Persian Jews), anti-semitism, and to Israel - currently involved in a debate on the term "Israeli apartheid", which someone has sadly made into an article.  At this point, I'm still learning what's going on in this corner of the wiki.Timothy Usher 21:06, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
 * It's very easy for him to assume that his edits are supported by consensus when he thinks he knows more about the subject than the 75 other people in this WikiProject put together. Kari Hazzard  ( talk  |  contrib ) 22:37, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Kari, what was the purpose of your highly personalized comment?Timothy Usher 22:44, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
 * A simple statement of fact. I request that you answer JFW's question on why you think your edits are supported by consensus.  Kari Hazzard  ( talk  |  contrib ) 23:00, 12 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm sorry, but your (incorrect) speculations about my thinking are not simple statements of fact. Consensus on wikipedia policy is decided on the relevant policy pages, not here.  If you'd to change WP:AGF to make an exemption which allows members of WikiProject Judaism to assume that other editors are motivated by anti-semitism, and to "be on the lookout" for them, I invite you to make your case there.Timothy Usher 23:07, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
 * No one is assuming that other editors are motivated by Anti-Semitism. It is a fact, however, that there have been Anti-Semitic editors and that members of this WikiProject can and should observe and correct such expressed opinions if encountered. That's all the project page, as it was originally was written, intended to state. Kari Hazzard  ( talk  |  contrib ) 23:15, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

I have to say I'm not incredibly impressed, Timothy, by your edits to Persian Jews, which seem to consist primarily of deleting text. I'm also rather unimpressed with your "defense" of Passover, which was nothing more than an editwar between you and User:Rickyrab (on my birthday, as it happens), wherein you castigated him with the following edit summary: "Rickyrab, this is an interesting idea, but we need to work it out on discussion, with sources, before, not after, sweeping changes are made. You may be absolutely right. Just show us." when you did nothing but remove a link to an outside source. Your first revert of Rickyrab gives no support for your actions, rather you respond to his edit summary with the dismissive (and wholly irrelevant) "party line? please". While I disagree with Rickyrab's edit summary and would be hesitant to openly support the edit he made, while reverting your reversion of his edit, he makes the reasonable request "Don't revert without first considering or investigating.", which you procede to revert again, saying "I've nothing against the Canaanites, but you need sources", completely ignoring the fact that you deleted a source in your revert. He then adds a source and invites you to discussion on Talk:Passover, whereupon you, on the talk page, say "This is potentially very interesting. I am only asking that we evaluate this before changing the article." Thereafter he provides a number of external links on the talk page, and instead of engaging in further constructive discussion, you just disappear from the article and its talk page, without bothering to undo your destructive edits. I don't have time to dig through your edits to Christianity and God, but I doubt I'm going to find anything that's going to provide evidence that you really are a constructive editor. Whining about WP:AGF only gets you so far...if you read the page far enough down, you'll find the paragraph that says, and I quote:
 * Of course, there's a difference between assuming good faith and ignoring bad actions. If you expect people to assume good faith from you, make sure you demonstrate it. Don't put the burden on others. Yelling "Assume Good Faith" at people does not excuse you from explaining your actions, and making a habit of it will convince people that you're acting in bad faith.

At this point, the onus is on you to demonstrate that AGF should be reapplied to your motivations, since the evidence I'm seeing says that any further assumption of good faith would be a violation of "fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice [or 50 times], shame on me". You telling us that we have to assume good faith on your part at this point sounds like little more than an attempt to make contributors to WP:JEW adhere to a Christian philosophy of "turning the other cheek" ad nauseum. Your protestations that you are somehow a wounded party or a great defender of Wikipedia policy, either in letter or in spirit, ring woefully hollow. Straighten up, or don't be surprised when you continue to find resistance to your curious misinterpretations about how WP operates. Cheers, Tom e rtalk 06:58, 15 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I never asked you, much less "whined at you", to assume my good faith, Tom, I asked the project not to assume the bad faith of Christian editors generally. I don't know what Christian scripture has to do with this; perhaps you can explain why you thought this on-topic.


 * On the Persian Jews article, the material deleted was rightfully deleted. There were several things I'd removed - one asserted that Persian Jews supported the Iranian Revolutionary Regime, cited to the regime-approved representative of the Jewish community.  Another was material purporting to show that Persian Jews are worse off in Israel than in Iran - one source was a Haaretz man-on-the-street interview (that's right, one guy in a human interest story - was it this one that said the reason that life in Israel sucked is that Israelis are greedy and out for themselves?) - as well as discussions of discrimination against Ethiopian Jews - not that I support such discrimination, nor do I doubt it exists...but Ethiopian Jews aren't Persian Jews.  Yet another qualified the regime's curtailment of contact with Jews outside of Israel by stating that it was only contact with "Zionists" which was forbidden.  Other removals were a series of feel-good pictures involving Jews and the Iranian leadership.  The editors insisting upon the inclusion of this material were recently before ArbCom, in which several were sanctioned regarding issues related to Iranian nationalism.  You be the judge.


 * Removal of poorly-sourced and biased material is a necessary and legitimate task, and I'd proudly do it again.


 * The RickyRab edit: The article was currently on the main page, in observance of Passover. It was personally important to me to ensure that any added material was legitimate.  Attributing the origins of passover to Caananite legend is a significant claim, and deserves significant evidence.  Hence, I asked it to be further explained.  As one edit was accompanied by a challenge to the "party line", I was a little unsure where it was coming from.  A revert isn't a crime.  In this case it was just a check to ensure that the article wasn't arbitrarily marred when it was on the main page.  Nor is it a crime not to stay on the talk page - I trusted other editors to take care of it after the dates had passed.Timothy Usher 07:39, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Having read the above discussion, I feel obliged to jump to Timothy's defense. Being the editor very heavily involved in editing Persian Jews, I attest to Timothy's above comments regarding his edits to this article; I did the same. On Passover, Timothy removed a bad faith original research tag placed there on Passover eve by an editor who felt disgruntled about a completely unrelated article. As far as the "Common differences..." section is concerned, it's always better to say that referring to Jesus of Nazareth as "Christ" violates WP:NPOV rather say it's offensive to the Jews. There are lots of things on Wikipedia that are offensive to different groups of people, but there is no reason to remove these things, as long as they are factually correct. A simple reference to WP:NPOV is unassailable, though. Pecher Talk 09:10, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Although I think many of Timothy's recent edits to Project Judaism have generally been mistakes, and the way he went about the complete removal of passages that have been agreed upon for a long time came across as very presumptuous and irritating, also I think his response to the criticism he received was an even bigger mistake. However, I think some people may have been excessivily harsh with the above comments. I really do not think we should question his value as an editor (or as a human being for that matter). Hopefully everyone can learn a lesson from this situation without it having to further degenerate to nobody's benefit.- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 09:29, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Moshe, I appreciate your comments. You know that one of my weaknesses is that I tend to get bristly when I feel like I'm under attack, and that clearly exacerbated the situation.  As "assume good faith!" is as often as not the motto of trolls and sockpuppets, let me put it another way: I'm not the enemy.  I'm just not.  You may not like my edits, but I continue to see them as the right thing.  "Jewish vs. Christian perspectives' is just not right.  I think I see what you were trying to say - Christians often do seek to own Jewish texts, and the term "Old Testament", and the assumptions it reflects, is part of this - and did my best to preserve it while getting rid of the presumption of conflict.  There are definitely anti-Semites on Wikipedia, but despite the horrors of European history most Christians (at least American Christians) who say "Jesus Christ" or speak of the "Old Testament" are not motivated by anti-Semitism.  And I stand by my judgements that there were ongoing violations of policy underpinning these sections.  It is simply not appropriate to list an article for all project members to POV swarm, even where I completely agree with the POV (I voted for the article's deletion).Timothy Usher 10:34, 15 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I understand that you feel that your edits were amd still are "right", but you also have to understand that almost everyone else that regularly edits this page thought that the edits were "not right", it was wrong of you to continue reverting everyone even after it was clear that there was near consensus against your actions. You should not have seen yourself as "under attack".- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 07:53, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

You may recall that I reverted your "amendments" only because as a complete outsider you sought to overthrow consensus. That is bad in article namespace, and that is bad with WikiProjects. You are not under attack. Now the changes have been made we should carry on minding our own business. JFW | T@lk  10:44, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Yeshivish
I have had many complaints about the article on Yeshivish for over a year. I have made several corrections to it myself, but it has so many problems that it goes beyond my abilities to fix the whole thing. I need help!

First of all, what does "Yeshivish" mean? It's a pretty informal term, no matter how it's used. In my experience, it's most commonly the term for "black hatter" Orthodox Jews, who are stricter than Modern Orthodox, but who aren't Hasidic. But it's also used to denote the dialect that those same Jews speak amongst each other. The first problem with the article is that deals almost exclusively with the dialect, and very little with the movement.

The article's discussion of Yeshivish speech itself has numerous problems. It cites Chaim Weiser's book Frumspeak as a "serious" study of Yeshivish. I haven't read the book myself, but I somehow doubt this claim. Moreover, is the book talking specifically about Yeshivish, or more broadly about the speech of all American Orthodox Jews? That point is never clarified.

The article's most ludicrous claim is its section on "Yeshivish grammar." It actually argues that Yeshivish has a distinct grammar that sets it apart from other dialects of English, purely because Yeshivish-speaking Jews add English plural endings to Hebrew and Yiddish words! (By that logic, non-Jews are speaking "Yeshivish" every time they say rabbis.)

The article is sorely in need of genuine scholarly data. From my experience, "Yeshivish" is nothing more than Yinglish mixed with Talmudic jargon. It is in no way a genuine dialect. marbeh raglaim 07:08, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Marbeh: Your request that "The article is sorely in need of genuine scholarly data" is odd, because the entire notion and construct of "Yeshivish" is new and is being constantly "invented" and "developed" as we speak here, so it is premature to expect "scholarly data" at this time, when very few gatherers of "scholarly data" have set foot in the world of Orthodox yeshivas, specifically in such places as the Lakewood yeshiva or the Mir yeshiva the hatching-grounds of pure "yeshivish"... IZAK 07:20, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

So what do you propose to do about the article? Keep it the way it is? Admittedly, the amount of scholarly info on Yeshivish is pretty scant, but one of the major problems with the article is that it draws several broad conclusions with very little backing. Either we need to find more relevant data or greatly reduce the article. We can't just keep it the way it is.

Sol Steinmetz's 1986 book Yiddish and English might be a starting point. Steinmetz examines Orthodox Jewish newspapers for examples of what he calls Orthodox English, finding sentences like the following: "In some shuls, the gabbai carries around three pushkas." Steinmetz does not mention the word Yeshivish, however, and one problem with his analysis is that he seems confused about the difference between Modern Orthodox Jews and Haredim. marbeh raglaim 22:51, 12 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Marbeh: The article should not be cut down just because you disagree with it. And it's no surprise that Sol is confused since Yeshivish is a fairly recent phenomenon unique to the Haredi world (more specifically the American non-Hasidic world, since Hasidim have their own version of Yinglish!) Furthermore, Yeshivish has NOTHING to do with Yiddish newpapers (because the present-day yeshiva crowd does not read Yiddish papers, and the English Torah papers do NOT use Yeshivish) and the synagogues are not the breeding, or nesting, grounds of Yeshivish, which by definition is the language of the Lithuanian yeshiva world of the so-called mitnagdim. So at this stage, it's definitely with us, and in fact this Wikipedia article is probably gathering information from editors who know something about it themselves, but at the same time it is NOT "original research" but rather the true description of a new type of "Yiddish-English-yeshiva-language" used by tens of thousands, and more added all the time, Jews. IZAK 10:30, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Many yeshivish speakers know little or no Yiddish, especially those from non-religious backgrounds who have made their way into the Yeshiva world. The accent, IMHO, is also quite different, and so is the idiom. I have no doubt in my mind that we should keep these articles seperate. JFW | T@lk  07:22, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Many yeshivish speakers know little or no Yiddish

Heh, you're talking to one now! And I think I know Yeshivish pretty well, even though I never completed my yeshiva education. Once many years ago, I happened to meet my Ivrit teacher, who's Israeli, outside a Dunkin' Donuts (a kosher one, mind you), and he noticed the gemara in my car. I told him that I go to a "shir." He immediately corrected me. "It's shee-YOOR. 'Shir' is a song!" I told him, "I'm speaking Yeshivish, not Hebrew!"

By the way, I wasn't talking about Yiddish newspapers at all. The Steinmetz book I cited was examining the influence that Yiddish has had on the English of Orthodox Jews, even those who don't speak Yiddish fluently. From my experience, the primary difference between Yeshivish and other forms of Yinglish is that it uses an unusually high degree of Talmudic expressions. Its most distinctive features are more like a religious jargon than a dialect. Take, for example, the following sentence from an Orthodox Jewish blog I read: "This is one of the major problems I have with the mentality of the right. Everything is a Shaila!" Try translating that sentence from Yeshivish into English. "This is one of the major problems I have with the mentality of the right. Everything is a question!" Even when "translated," the sentence still cannot be understood by an outsider. That's why it's a jargon: it's not just that it uses unfamiliar words and expressions, but that it depends on a body of knowledge that outsiders lack.

Still, neither of you have addressed any of my specific objections to the article. I never said that I "disagree" with the article. The problems with the article have nothing to do with personal disagreements but with bad scholarship, plain and simple. I do not "disagree" with the statement that one distinctive characteristic of Yeshivish is attaching the English plural ending -s to words drawn from Hebrew, for example saying "yeshivas" (instead of yeshivos or yeshivot). I do not "disagree" with that statement; it is simply false. Non-Yeshivish speakers, including non-Jews, also say "yeshivas." marbeh raglaim 11:14, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

To whats been mentioned here, people who speak in a yeshivishe reid often use the Hebrew or yiddish plural. Also, that "Yeshivish speakers often know little or no Yiddish", Thats a misconception. My rebbeim always speak in Yeshivishe reid, yet chunks of the time they are speaking straight yiddish. when it comes down to it, yeshivish is really yiddish with english, hebrew, aramaic, a minimal amount of french and slavic languges added in. Shaul avrom 14:01, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Boyarin paragraph in Judaism article
There is somewhat of a debate as to the appropriateness of the above paragraph in the article Judaism vs. the article Jew. I'd request this illustrious's assemblage's opinions on the matter. A brief glance at the article’s history, together with the more recent entries and repartees on Talk:Judaism should be sufficient to give an overview of the issue. Thank you -- Avi 14:37, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Orthodoxy: Founded vs. Maintained
Another disagreement on which I am requesting project-member input: Please see Talk:Judaism. Thank you. -- Avi 22:05, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Problem with Kugel (disambiguation)
I'm having a bit of a problem with a user who insists on adding irrelevant material to the Kugel (disambiguation) page. Most of the material is German language compound words, and German surnames containing "kugel", and I don't see the relevance to the English language page. I've tried to reason with the user, first on his talk page, then on the articles, but I don't seem to be getting anything coherent from him. He just says that he's "listed the article for translation" (see the article's talk page. Some sane voices are needed. Any suggestions what to do? Regards, Batamtig 10:38, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

too tings
not sure these will pique anyone's interest here, but here they are for your consideration: Cheers, Tom e rtalk 06:11, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Beyajad
 * James Wickstrom

JE citations
I've been working on converting a lot of Jewish Encyclopedia articles to Wikipedia and I've developed what I think is a good citation format for the reference section that incorporates both the JE article itself and the sources for that article. For example:


 * Gottheil, Richard and Samuel Krauss. "Onias." Jewish Encyclopedia. Funk and Wagnalls, 1901-1906, which cites to the following ibliography:
 * H. P. Chajes, Beiträge zur Nordsemitischen Onomatologie, p. 23, Vienna, 1900 (on the name);
 * Herzfeld, Gesch. des Volkes Jisrael, i. 185-189, 201-206;
 * Grätz, Gesch. 2d ed., ii. 236;
 * Schürer, Gesch. 3d ed., i. 182, 194-196; iii. 97-100;
 * Niese, in Hermes, xxxv. 509;
 * Wellhausen, I. J. G. 4th ed., p. 248, Berlin, 1901;
 * Willrich, Juden und Griechen vor der Makkabäischen Erhebung, pp. 77, 109, Göttingen, 1895;
 * A. Büchler, Die Tobiaden und die Oniaden, pp. 166, 240, 275, 353, Vienna, 1899;
 * J. P. Mahaffy, The Empire of the Ptolemies, pp. 217, 353, London, 1895;
 * Gelzer, Sextus Julius Africanus, ii. 170-176, Leipsic, 1885;
 * Weiss, Dor, i. 130 (on the halakic view of the temple of Onias).

My reasoning is that if you're going to take a public domain article wholesale from some source you should identify the sources cited in that article (saying "this article came from JE" when the article is a verbatim repetition of the JE text doesn't seem very helpful).

I'd like to try and get this accepted as a standard, but obviously not without some consensus on the issue. Does anyone have any thoughts on the issue? Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 12:56, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Looks good to me, but I don't use the JE as a source myself for a number of reasons. Kari Hazzard ( talk  |  contrib ) 13:15, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Kari, the issue of the Jewish Encyclopedia's reliability has come up on the talk page of another article. Why don't you like to use it as a source?Timothy Usher 07:34, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
 * A lot of major events have happened to and involving the Jewish people since the JE was released. The fact that the JE is in many cases out of date doesn't invalidate it as a source outright, but I'd prefer to be working with more recent sources. Kari Hazzard  ( talk  |  contrib ) 12:24, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

JE article are very difficult to read, I think we should start a campaign to clean the articles that borrow heavily from JE. Perhaps a collaboration of the week. Anyone interested? Jon513 18:36, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Could be done. Can we get a list of articles that use the JE as a source? I'd be willing to help. Kari Hazzard  ( talk  |  contrib ) 19:08, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
 * yes, Category:Jewish Encyclopedia. Jon513 20:15, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Considering the number of articles, that may only be a collaboration of the year. Pecher Talk 07:56, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
 * In general the Jewish Encyclopedia articles about halakha or tanakh need the more clean up. Those that are biographies are not that bad.  Jon513 12:28, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
 * I've started the process at a few articles like Antigonus of Sokho, Onias, Jose ben Yochanan, where I've moved inline citations to footnotes in an attempt to streamline the text while preserving the citations to sources. The footnotes themselves I've tried to make more comprehensible, expanding obscure abbreviations and the like. I've also proposed this as a "to do" item at the Jewish History. Wikiproject. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 15:05, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

New article review: Get (conflict)
A serious, fairly new, article Get (conflict) (that is NOT part of the Get (divorce document) article) was posted by User:David91 and may require some serious review and further input and comment/s. Thank you. IZAK 10:37, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Xueta
A mess. See Talk:Xueta. Among many other things, claims about Halakha that I don't think are accurate. But I'm pretty ignorant on the topic of the Xuetes. Perhaps someone here is clueful and can help fix the article? - Jmabel | Talk 23:49, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
 * I've made one of my typically productive comments on the talk page there. Tom e rtalk  21:35, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

36000 non existing articles
You might be interested in:
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in the Bible
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in the Gospel of Matthew
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in 1 Esdras
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in 2 Esdras
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in 1 Maccabees
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in 2 Maccabees
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in the Book of Tobit
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in the Book of Judith
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in the Book of Wisdom
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in Ecclesiasticus
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in the Book of Baruch
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in the Story of Susanna
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in Bel and the Dragon
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in Second Chronicles
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in the Book of Ezra
 * Articles for deletion/List of chapters and verses in First Kings

Clinkophonist 19:44, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
 * In the name of all that is good and holy and not submersed in flavorful chocolate sauce... What the heck? Honestly, I'm more torn between DELETE (the obvious conclusion) and SPEEDY DELETE the likely second choice. I do not doubt whoever made those articles went to sufficient effort doing so... But they're so utterly pointless! Kari Hazzard  ( talk  |  contrib ) 20:45, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Destroy. Please. This is an encyclopedia, not a running Biblical commentary. JFW | T@lk  22:45, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

AFD, please vote
Articles for deletion/Criticism of Judaism and the article itself Criticism of Judaism. Not worth the bytes it's written with. JFW | T@lk  23:41, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Please see my comments below... Tom e rtalk 00:54, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Also, see my inline-note in the Islamic criticisms section [you'll have to click [edit] to see it]. Tom e rtalk  01:29, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Please read and consider my note at Talk:Criticism of Judaism. Tom e rtalk 02:21, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Tomer disagreeing with Norman Stillman
In Muhammad and in the above-mentioned Criticism of Judaism article, the claim is made that "some medieval Jews" called Mohammed "al-meshuggah"...
 * From Muhammad:
 * In the Middle Ages, Jews usually referred to Muhammad as ha-meshuggah ("the madman" or "possessed"), a title contemptuously used in the Hebrew Bible for impostors who think of themselves as prophets.
 * This has a footnote to
 * Stillman, Norman (1979). The Jews of Arab Lands: A History and Source Book, p. 236, Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America. ISBN 082760198.
 * Some of you may recognize the name of Norman Stillman from the fracas going on over at Talk:Banu Nadir. That aside, however,
 * From Criticism of Judaism comes this completely uncited gem:
 * Defamation of Muhammad
 * There are Muslims who feel that Judaism belittled and continues to belittle Muhammad. In the Middle Ages some Jews deemed Muhammad to be ha-meshuggah or "the madman." During the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy Muslims in several nations believed that followers of Judaism were somehow involved or supportive of the view of Muhammad.

Now, leaving aside the outrageous uncited assertions made in the "defamation of Muhammad" ("there are muslims who feel"...boohoo, but who?; Judaism belittled muhammad?  how?  Judaism belittles muhammad?  how?  Judaism is now a person that it can belittle someone in the past?  "In the middle ages"...yank yank...Muhammad didn't live in the middle ages.  "relevance, your honor."  "During the Jyllands-posten...muslims in several nations believed..." yeah, um THAT'S BECAUSE THEIR LEADERS AND MEDIA LIED TO THEM AND TOLD THEM THAT CRAP!  It's called "anti-semitism", not "criticism of Judaism", and saying "followers of Judaism" instead of "Jews" is just a weak way to incorporate this crap into the article, but I digress...), the problem with this is that Stillman is being cited in a way that misrepresents what he wrote:  In The Jews of Arab Lands: A History and Source Book, on p. 236, there's a footnote to something the Rambam is writing to the Teimanim, in `Igereth Teiman. Specifically, the translation says (talking about false prophets):
 * The first to take up this course was Jesus the Nazarene, may his bones be ground to dust. He was of Israel. Later, there arose a madman who followed his example...

which is where we find Stillman's uncited footnote, which says:
 * Medieval Jewish writers commonly referred to Muhammad as ha-meshugga. The term was pregnant with connotations. In the Bible, it was used contemptuously for those who think themselves prophets (Jer. 29:26; Hos. 9:7).  Furthermore, because the pagans of Mecca believed Muhammad to be just another poet or soothsayer [...], the Koran states that Muhammad is not mad or possessed.  See for example Sura 81:22.

Now, after all that, what do I want to do? Until Stillman comes and provides us with a source that Medieval Jewish writers commonly called Muhammad "hammeshuggah", I want this crap removed. The fact that Stillman says that Jer. 29:26 and Hos. 9:7 are examples of contemptuous use of "meshuggah" to refer to people who think of themselves as prophets, leads me to regard his scholarship contemptuously. (Jeremiah says that the prophets were incarcerated with the insane, because of the corruption of the priesthood, and Hosea says the prophets are fools (not insane)--because of the iniquity of the people. In neither case is the usage contemptuous of the meshug`im, in both cases the meshug`im are victims of iniquity...)  If it's true that medieval Jews referred to Muhammad as "ha-meshugga`", my guess is that it's for one of two reasons, if not both--they really did perceive him as crazy (a charge the Qur'an alone disputes) or because his followers were so bloodthirsty that if any Jew in muslimia had actually said the things about him that they were masking with "המשוגע", they would have been signing their death warrants. Now, that all presupposes that Stillman's interpretation of the Rambam's use of "a madman" is correct. Not only did the Rambam not call him the meshuggah, but it's just as likely that the meshuga to whom he's refering is Bar Kokhba, Paul, Nero (read this if that assertion confuses you), ...  From what I'm seeing, Stillman's assertion is pretty flimsy, and way too flimsy to, on its own, stand in as a reliable source for the defamation of all Jews for all time, as the Criticism of Judaism article does.

Thoughts? Tom e rtalk 01:28, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

As a footnote...Hosea 9:7 does use the word "meshuga`", but it uses it as a description of "the man of spirit", not for prophets, as Stillman implies. Tom e rtalk 01:31, 19 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Shall I remind you of WP:NOR, Tomer? Norman Stillman happens to be Chair of Judaic history at the University of Oklalhoma; he is a student of Shelomo Dov Goitein and one of the greatest authorities on the Jewish history in Muslim lands, the book above being the basic reference text on this subject. Of course, you can disagree with him, but WP:NOR is there for a reason. I'm not going to argue against your interpretation of Maimonides' Yemeni Epistle, which is extremely dubious to say the least, for the very same reason: I'm not aware of any scholar agreeing with you on that matter. Ditto for everything else. Pecher Talk 21:58, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Don't bother reminding me of WP:NOR. I'm not proposing to include my crackpot theories in the article, I'm only saying that this one assertion of Stillman's at the very least is based on very poor scholarship.  As for "extremely dubious", I'm not sure whether you're referring to `Igereth Teiman or my interpretation thereof as "dubious", but if you're saying the Epistle is extremely dubious, then so is anything Stillman expounds on based on something written therein, and if it's my interpretation that you find "extremely dubious", that's interesting, since I haven't interpreted anything therein.  What I have said is that the citations Stillman uses as a basis for his assertion that the word משוגע was, to quote him, used contemptuously for those who think themselves prophets, is extremely dubious.  There's no "interpretation" required.  Stillman even cites the verses he used to make this assertion (to wit, Jer. 29:26 and Hos. 9:7)...neither of which call prophets crazy, nor link the status of crazies with contempt.  Now, what exactly are you saying no scholar agrees with me on?  My interpretation of those two verses?  Or my criticism of Stillman's completely fallacious interpretation?  I've asked for another source beside Stillman that says medieval Jews "frequently" called Muhammad (who in no way a medieval figure) "המשוגע".  Unless Stillman just pulled this assertion out of ... thin air, someone should be able to find someone else besides Stillman who's made such a statement.  Cheers, Tom e rtalk  22:20, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Again, I must you remind you of the basic Wikipedia policies such as WP:NOR and of the WP:RS guideline. Unless you can cite sources that support your opinion, your personal objections to Stillman's conclusions are of exactly zero value. Pecher Talk 07:02, 26 June 2006 (UTC)


 * BTW, what are we supposed to infer from the offensive title that you have chosen for the title of thise section? Your arguments boil down to the claims that you disagree with Stillman, not to your demonstrating that a certain editor has misreprented Stillman. Pecher Talk 22:17, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
 * You're not supposed to infer anything from the title, although clearly you've chosen to do so. Tom e rtalk  22:21, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, there is no need to infer anything because the title clearly accuses the editor who inserted that references to Norman Stillman of misrepresenting Stillman's arguments, even though everything posted below are your personal disagreements with Stillman. I'm changing the section title accordingly. Pecher Talk 07:02, 26 June 2006 (UTC)


 * as for misreading and misrepresenting Stillman, in Criticism of Islam, we have the following statement: "During the time of Muhammad [41] and later in Middle Ages, Jews usually referred to Muhammad as ha-meshuggah ("the madman" or "possessed"), a title contemptuously used in the Hebrew Bible for impostors who think of themselves as prophets. [42]" The citations are: 41 (nothing more than a translation from the Qur'an, that says nothing about what Jews said about Muhammad) and [42] is "Stillman, Norman (1979). The Jews of Arab Lands: A History and Source Book, p. 236, Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America. ISBN 082760198.".  This is basically the same thing it says in Muhammad and used to say in Criticism of Judaism.  The entire quotation is presented as though Stillman is making assertions about what Jews were saying about Muhammad in the days of Muhammad.  Also, by changing "commonly" to "usually", and "Jewish writers" to "Jews", the entire tone of Stillman's statement is changed to say something he didn't.  Now, that said, Pecher, if you think the name for this section is "offensive", my user talkpage is the place to take that up.  On this page, stick to the topic at hand, instead of trying to delegitimize what I'm saying by mischaracterizing superfluous minutiae.  Thanks.  Tom e rtalk  22:41, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
 * These are not "superfluous minutiae", but a correct observation on the way you have approached this discussion. If you cannot create a neutral section title, then please refrain from creating section titles at all. A couple of extremely minot paraphrases do not change the entire tone of the statement, nor do they make Stillman say something he didn't. If your problem was with a couple of words, you should have changed them to suit your liking instead of launching that spurious, but venomous assault. Pecher Talk 07:02, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Verifying a 17th centrury female "rabbi"
Asenath Barzani: The article about this alleged female "rabbi" needs some serious reviewing. Thank you, IZAK 05:22, 20 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I see you are a bit incredulous, but the basic facts are in fact quite clear: Her title was Tanna’it, her job was Rosh yeshiba. Extant letters show that she struggled a great deal with fundraising. The article needs a bit of stylistic work and some sorting out of elements from historical documents vs. elements from Kurdish Jewish folklore, but that’s a different story. -- Olve 09:02, 20 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Does she have Semicha ? See my comments on the article.--yisraeldov 13:50, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Reminder: NPOV means multiple, sometimes uncomfortable POVs

 * Wikipedia's NPOV policy often means multiple points of view. This means providing not only the points of view of different groups today, but different groups in the past.... Adherents of a religion may object to a critical historical treatment of their own faith. They would prefer that the articles describe their faith according to their tradition and understanding, which often differs substantially from the view commonly held by critical historians. Non adherents of a religion may feel the exact opposite, and prefer that the views of critical historians be given primacy; many articles on Wikipedia currently reflect the latter point of view. NPOV policy demands both points of view be presented without prejudice.  --WikiProject Judaism

I am sad to say that many members of this Wikiproject aren't adhering to these ideals at Banu Nadir, and those who have not are apparently reluctant to participate in mediation. I would like to ask the other members of this project to encourage them to do so. Thank you. Publicola 07:07, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

minor irritant
does anyone know why there are no [edit] tags on the various sections of the project page? Tom e rtalk 03:06, 23 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I localized the problem down to the table in ==Templates== section. ←Humus sapiens ну? 03:28, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
 * OK, I went through and changed the whole thing from WikiML to HTML, and the problem is still the same...so the problem is with one of the templates themselves, not with the table itself...so I'm reverting to the WikiML version and I'm gonna go through them one at a time to see which one is making the mess... more scintillating news to come, I'm sure! :-p  Tom e rtalk  23:28, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, I've localized the problem to Torah portion, which I've commented out until someone w/ more time than I have right now, can fix that one... Tom e rtalk  23:41, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

SUCCESS! I've removed the offending markup from Torah portion. If someone wants to go back and hack the color scheme to their preferences, go for it, but please leave the header and footer boxes out. Consequently, I'm uncommenting the template from the project page. שבת שלום לכולם! Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk 23:56, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Glad we got this out of the way. ←Humus sapiens ну? 01:26, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Somebody posting anti-Semitic garbage
On the talk page to Sheldon Silver, scroll down and you will see that someone has posted anti-Semitic nonsense with lots of fake quotes from the Talmud. The standard stuff that has been debunked a thousand times. We need to do something about this. marbeh raglaim 16:15, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Removed. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€  16:21, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Criticism of Modern Orthodoxy vs. Other Movements Unequal
The present Modern Orthodox Judaism article has a large criticism section. It is the only article on a major Jewish movement/denomination that has one. I suggest equalizing the treatment of criticism tof the major movements. Do people think this observation is a fair one? Would people prefer to remove the MO criticism section, or add analagous criticism sections to Reform Judaism, Conservative Judaism, etc. identifying the major objections each has gotten from its right and left? --Shirahadasha 20:41, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
 * I think that it'd be most appropriate to start criticism sections for the other movements too, though I personally would not be the right person to write such sections. The fact that criticism of Reform and Conservative Judaism isn't being discussed in text is not a valid reason to cut out part of the MO article. Kari Hazzard ( talk  |  contrib ) 03:26, 24 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't think that the two things are comparable at all. Every article that has legitimate verifiable criticism should have a criticism section. We do not need to add or remove criticism section so that all the articles are equal.  That being said, there are many legitimate verifiable criticism of reform and conservative and they should be expanded.  Jon513 20:12, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

WikiProject Deletion sorting/Judaism
Dear everyone! I have created WikiProject Deletion sorting/Judaism. Please put it on your watchlists, and please add relevant AfD's as you find them. Cheers. - CrazyRussian talk/email 14:09, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Aruch HaShulchan on Hilchos Tisha Be'Av at Wikisource
As we mark Rosh Chodesh Tamuz, I am pleased to announce that the Arukh Hashulchon on the complete halachos of the three weeks and Tisha be'av (simonim 549-561) is now available online in digital form at Hebrew Wikisource.

These are free-content, typed digital versions of the simonim that may be copied, pasted, printed, used or adapted freely for any purpose.

You can call up one siman at a time, or view all of Hilchos 9Av together on a single page.

The online text is based on the printed book (public domain), but the abbreviations (roshei tevos) have been expanded, full punctuation has been added, and the text has been divided into smaller paragraphs.

Along with using it, feel free to improve it and add to it as well.

In general, I would be very pleased to increase interaction on Jewish topics between Wikipedia and Wikisource. Dovi 06:30, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Humor in the Torah?
Someone has (legitimately, I think) questioned the opening of Jewish humor: "Jewish humor is the long tradition of humor in Judaism dating back to the Torah and the Midrash…" They ask, "Can someone tell me what is so funny in the Torah? It's got a lot of laws and myths, but no humour." I would say, from my less-than-thorough knowledge, that this person is correct. There is some humor, perhaps, to be found in the Talmud, but not (to the best of my knowledge) in the Torah. In fact, the only joke I can think of in the Bible is New Testament and terribly told (Titus 1:12). Anyway, I realize that this article is slightly off topic for this WikiProject, but I figure I'm more likely to find a good Torah scholar here than at "secular Jewish culture". - Jmabel | Talk 00:12, 29 June 2006 (UTC)


 * There is definitely some wordplay in the Torah/Tanach. For instance, God tells David that because David had planned to build a house for God (the Temple), God would establish his house (family) as royalty. Also, although it doesn't translate at all, the snake in the garden of Eden is called "arum," cunning, while Asam and Eve are "arumim," naked. It seems that the words were used that way intentionally. There are other examples of wordplay (the "nahash hanehoshet," for example), but I can't think of any especially humorous ones offhand. I always thought Haman's downfall was pretty funny, though. (How about Joseph playing a practical joke on his brothers? ... Or maybe not.) Anyway, there may be some room to talk about humor in the Torah. --Eliyak 02:55, 29 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Now I recall that some of the passages on idolatry in the later prophets are pretty humorous. For instance, the prophet(Isaiah?) mocks idolators by describing a person chopping a log in two, using half of it to cook his dinner and carving the other half into an idol and treating it as a god. --Eliyak 03:02, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Not only that, he says to it "You are my god, you created me."--Batamtig 07:43, 29 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I can think of two other instances, both from Nevi'im.
 * (1) The first is downright scatological. Ehud kills Eglon, the king of Moab, stabbing him so that "the dirt came out"... he then left and locked the room; Eglon's servants smelled the stench and thought "the king is relieving himself."
 * (2) The second is when Elijah challenges the priests of Baal. When Baal fails to ignite the sacrifice, Elijah tells them to call out to him louder, because he might be sleeping. --Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 13:42, 29 June 2006 (UTC)


 * How about the part in Esther where King Achashveros can't sleep so his courtiers read him the chronicles of his deeds to help make him drowsy? That's not a joke? The whole Megilla, as they say, is full of humor, --Shirahadasha 04:29, 29 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I think that there is a lot of Jewish humor which is based on the torah, but that does not say that the torah is funny. For example, charity in the bible is call "’’Zedakha’’" - which also means "just, right, and correct".  Many explain that for Jews charity is viewed  as an obligation - not going above and beyond (ie "’’chesed’’").  This is reflected in some Jewish jokes such as   A pauper who's brother recently died come to the rich man to collect his weekly hand-out.  He received he regular portion and exclaims "where is my brother's hand-out".  "You brother is dead" explains the patron.  "Tell me", asks the poor man, "am I my brother's heir or are you?"   The joke is expressing, to some extend, the Jewish view of charity (that the pauper views himself as entitled to the charity not that the rich man is going above and beyond the call of duty).  Jon513 12:34, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Hello!
Hello. A Christian keeps on censoring Martin Rosen's abusive behaviour can something be done about it? 203.214.133.79 16:59, 29 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Now a Jew has done the same. Please follow Wikipedia's WP:NPOV policy. If you do, your contributions are more likely to remain part of the article. Calling JfJ a "cult" is troublesome. Listing criticism of Rosen before anything else is also not the accepted form. JFW | T@lk  17:10, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Obvious attempt to delete Shefa article in bad faith
I have repeatedly offered to set up interviews between Wikipedia editors and people at the Shefa Network. Tellingly, not a single person trying to delete the article has accepted this offer. They also refuse to read the sources that were given. This total refusal speaks volumes. It is especialy bizarre that while people who know nothing about this group are trying to delete its article, members of all of Conservative Judaism's organizations are now working with Shefa. At this point it is no longer a matter of personal opinion. It is a now a fact that:


 * Members of the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards are contributors to Shefa
 * Members of the faculty at the movement's rabbinic seminary (Jewish Theological Seminary of America) are contributors.
 * A growing number of rabbis from the Rabbinical Assembly are contributors
 * Faculty from Conservative Judaism's Solomon Schechter schools are working with Shefa.
 * Shefa Newtork has already held two conferences, and two more events are already being planned, as well as yet another journal.
 * At this very moment people from the Rabbinical Assembly are preparing for a tele-conference with multiple people from Shefa about the new Shefa websites, and coordinating with the new Conservative Judaism websites.

This group is far more influential than dozens, perhaps hundreds, of other groups that currently have articles on Wikipedia. Note that the history of the delete attempt is even more telling: A handful of people started an attempt to delete this article within minutes of its creation, based upon their personal dislike of me. They started a campaign to delete it without even looking at the issue; they even have refused all attempts to give them interviews, and they clearly refuse to research the issue themselves.

We must not allow a few people to delete Wikipedia articles in this fashion. They are not applying that normal Wikipedia standards that we apply to all of our other articles. And they are egging on others to do the same, when those other people know literally nothing about the issue. Voting on whether or not to keep this article is of no use if some people voting are violating traditional Wikipedia standards. This is now a matter that Wikipedia administrators need to look into. RK 14:18, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Making challenges in bad faith
Someone recently made a claim on the Shefa Netork article that this article is not reliable as it is making unsourced claims and presenting original research. Yet here on its Talk page I discovered that no one actually made such a claim. First off, no research at all, from any point of view, is given! Secondly, the article does contain sources, and we continually offer first hand verification of any detail whatsoever. ''We have repeatedly offered interviews with people involved, in case they have any questions about the accuracy of any statements. Sadly, however, every single person has declined this offer.'' RK

Since when can Wikipedia editors simply deny the existence of sources? How would they feel if me and a dozen of my friends went to an article about a new Orthodox Jewish organization, or a new environmental organization, and wrote "No sources are given. This article should be deleted." Well, they would rightly protest "But many sources are given, and people from this organization really do exist; I can introduce you to them personally!" But as we see here, the new tactic being used by a tiny group is pretending that such responses don't exist, and write "Since they didn't offer any sources, then we must delete the article." It is clear that this is gross dishonesty. My colleagues would never do this to anyone, and I can't understand why it is being done to this group.

Refusing to accept the very existence of sources such as journal articles, websites, conferences with people from multiple states, and first-hand interviews with people involved is a rejection of the way that Wikipedia works for all other articles. We are dealing here with a deliberate attempt to not follow the process. If Wikipedia policy is to mean anything, then it must be applied to all groups, not just one. RK 18:12, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

"Wimple" & "Wimpel"
Hi folks: Could people please take a look at a new article: Wimpel created by User:Rabbi-m it strike me as being written as somewhat "tongue in cheek", and should perhaps be re-directed to another article. I don't know what to make of it. Thanks, IZAK 09:34, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
 * wha? Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk  22:04, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Template: Torah portion
Hi everyone:

User:msh210 has disagreed with me (see User talk:IZAK) about placing Torah portion on each of the follwoing articles. He has placed the follwing basic objection on each page: "What is Torah portion doing on this page? Completelt irrelevant.&mdash;msh210 &#x2120; 19:06, 2 July 2006 (UTC)."

In response I am centralizing the discussions here. I am also providing the full text of my first response on each article's talk page here, listed as point "Reason/s (1)" for each article, the other three reasons were the same on/for all the articles: That: (2) The template Torah portion is at the bottom of the Maftir article's page, so essentially it's part of the "See also" section which is a legitimate way of connecting related and connected topics on an article. (3) If a reader finds the Torah portion to be "too intrusive" then any reader is free to click "Hide" on the top right section of the template's heading which shrinks it to an unobtrusive one liner. Finally, (4) the Torah portion is presently diligently updated weekly by User:Dauster early each Sunday so that any readers may learn more about the weekly Parsha. User:Dauster summarizes each week's Parsha and adds some interesting graphics which surely adds life and color to a page that may gain the attention of readers who don't know much about this subject and may want to learn more. Please refer all further comments and discussions to one centralized location at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Judaism Thank you. IZAK 08:25, 4 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Maftir (see Talk:Maftir)
 * Reason/s: (1) The Maftir and the weekly Torah reading of the Parsha (Torah portion) are both part of the services on Shabbat, and the Maftir is the last part of each Shabbat's Torah reading.
 * List of Jewish prayers and blessings (see Talk:List of Jewish prayers and blessings)
 * Reason/s: (1) List of Jewish prayers and blessings and the weekly Torah reading of the Parsha (Torah portion) are all part of the weekly Torah readings on Monday and Thursday morning Shacharit services, as well as during the services on Shabbat.
 * Cantillation (see Talk:Cantillation)
 * Reason/s: (1) Cantillation is the unique way the weekly Torah reading of the Parsha (Torah portion) is "read/sung" in synagogue on Mondays and Wednesdays during Shacharit services, and notably in the services on Shabbat.
 * Haftarah (see Talk:Haftarah)
 * Reason/s: (1) The Haftarah and the weekly Torah reading of the Parsha (Torah portion) are both part of the services on Shabbat. The Haftarah comes after the Maftir as the last part of each Shabbat's Torah reading. (2) The ancient Jewish sages who created the system of reading the Haftarah with the weekly Torah portion chose sections from Tanakh for the Haftarah to match a major a major theme in each week's Parsha, so that the Parsha and Hafatarah are intrinsically connected.
 * Tikkun (book) (see Talk:Tikkun (book))
 * Reason/s: (1) The Tikkun (book) is the unique "book" that is used to prepare for the cantillation of the weekly Torah reading of the Parsha (Torah portion) on Shabbat in synagogue. It is the "tool" that a ba'al koreh ("Torah reader") uses to familiarize himself with that week's Torah portion.
 * Sefer Torah (see Talk:Sefer Torah)
 * Reason/s: (1) The Sefer Torah is divided into 54 portions, known as Parshas (parshiyot) and each week's Torah reading of a Parsha (Torah portion) is read directly from a Sefer Torah scroll in synagogue on Shabbat, as well as on Monday and Thursday mornings.
 * Humash (see Talk:Humash)
 * Reason/s: (1) Humash is the Hebrew name for the Pentateuch. The Humash refers to a "Hebrew Pentateuch". A Humash is almost always divided not only by verses and chapters (which is of non-Jewish origins) but by the 54 Parshas (parshiyot) which is the tradition of Judaism. The Humash thus contains each week's Torah reading of the weekly Parsha (Torah portion) read as part of the services on Shabbat, and the Monday and Thursday Torah readings.
 * Torah study (see Talk:Torah study)
 * Reason/s: (1) The most basic and universal Torah study that is done by Jews worldwide on all days is to study, attend classes about, and listen to sermons derived directly from that week's Torah reading (in synagogues on Shabbat) based on the weekly Parsha (Torah portion) as stated in this article itself in a few places, even quoting a source for the principle: "It is the duty of everyone to read the entire weekly portion twice (the law of shnayim mikra ve-echad targum, Tractate Berakhot 8a).
 * B'nai Mitzvah (see Talk:B'nai Mitzvah)
 * Reasons/s: (1) The high-point of any B'nai Mitzvah religious "right of passage" celebration to Jewish adulthood is for the child to study to chant sections of, or the entire, Torah reading from that week's Parsha (Torah portion) read in synagogue on the Shabbat closest to their 13th birthday. Indeed, the date and time of one's Bar Mitzvah celebration on Shabbat is always derived from the weekly Torah portion (Parsha) on which the Bar Mitzvah will be celebrated. Question: "When is/was your Bar Mitzvah?" Answer: "On parshas XYZ."

The following were not mentioned by User:msh210 on User talk:IZAK, but should be included here to show their relevance:


 * Jewish services (see Talk:Jewish services)
 * Reason/s: (1) The central focus of Jewish services on every Shabbat in synagogue as well as on Monday and Thursday mornings at Shacharit services is the Torah reading of that week's Parsha (Torah portion).
 * Shabbat (see Talk:Shabbat)
 * Reason/s: (1) The central part of Jewish services on Shabbat in synagogue is the cantillation of the Torah reading for that week's Parsha (Torah portion) and it is also usually the basis of the rabbi's sermon and the source of classes and lectures during the week. Bar Mitzvah celebrations often involve the reading of the weekly Torah portion on Shabbat in synagogue by the Bar Mitzvah boy (or girl in non-Orthodox settings).
 * Torah reading (see Talk:Torah reading)
 * Reason/s: (1) The weekly Torah reading on Shabbat and on Monday and Thursday mornings in all synagogues is based on that week's Parsha (Torah portion).
 * Parsha (see Talk:Parsha)
 * Reason/s: (1) The weekly Parsha (Torah portion) is the main Torah reading in all synagogues every Shabbat as well as on Monday and Thursday mornings.


 * With all due respect the sections are out of place. A "see also" is a link to another section not an entire section copied there.  The user should have to click on something to get information that is related (like all "see also"s) not click to hide something. As the Torah portion is out of the scope of all the articles (while certainly not out of the scope of a "see also") they should be converted into a single link.  Jon513 11:31, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Jon: The user is intelligent and can click on links in "See also" links or click on a "Hide" click. With the "Hide" clicked, the entire template becomes one line at the bottom of the page and has the same function as any other "See also". IZAK 11:54, 7 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Is there a way to make it hidden by default? Jon513 13:08, 7 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Per my initial objection, I agree with Jon513 11:31, 4 July 2006 (UTC).&mdash;msh210 &#x2120; 18:01, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

The following is copied from Template talk:Torah portion:

Transclusion
IZAK just transcluded this template into a whole bunch of pages where I don't think it belongs. (See Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:Torah portion.) I've commented on each of those pages' talk pages.&mdash;msh210 &#x2120; 20:56, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Indeed. The length and ever-changing nature of the template makes it completely inappropriate for the article namespace.  -Joshuapaquin 21:31, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Quite. Rich Farmbrough 19:32 3 July 2006 (GMT). &mdash;msh210 &#x2120; 18:14, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

The template is now non existent.--Shaul avrom 14:48, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Savora
There is now an article on Savora about the Savoraim -- can anyone review it and add to it? Thanks. IZAK 11:02, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Orthodox POVs under attack as "nonsense" in Talmud article
Many Orthodox and classical rabbinic POVs about the Talmud are repeatedly being censored and mass-deleted. A person ignorant of classical Jewish and Orthodox Jewish views of the Talmud has ironically named himself "Talmud Defender" and keeps using reverts and mass deletions to wipe out all classical rabbinic and Orthodox Jewish POVs about the Talmud, except for his own personal view.


 * He claims that historical study of the Talmud began only in the modern era, and by Conservative rabbis.  That claim is mistaken, as well as uncourced.


 * In the edit line comments, he attacks all POVs that he disagrees with as "nonsense" and simply wipes the entire article clear of all such citations.


 * "Talmud Defender" attacks and classical rabbis and Orthodox Jews who accept historical analysis of the Talmud, by falsely painting them as non-Orthodox. This constitutes a personal attack.  (For those of you who do not know, accusing an Orthodox rabbi of being non-Orthodox is a grave personal insult in the Orthodox Jewish community.)


 * Due to his non-stop reverts, we can't add new sources from classical and Orthodox rabbis, such as:


 * Orthodox Rabbi Yaakov Hayim Sofer (great-grandson of the Kaf ha-Hayyim) is similarly clear that the text of the gemara has had changes and additions, and contains statements not of the same origin as the original. See his Yehi Yosef (Jerusalem, 1991) p.132  "This passage does not bear the signature of the editor of the Talmud!"


 * The Gaonic respona literature - Teshuvot Geonim Kadmonim, section 78, deals with mistaken biblical readings in the Talmud. (Although there are many quotes in the Talmud that are assumed to come directly from the Tanakh, a direct comparison of the quotes with any standard Torah or Tanakh shows that many of these quotes are incorrect)  This Gaonic respona states:


 * ...But you must examine carefully in every case when you feel uncertainty [as to the credibility of the text] - what is its source? Whether a scibral error? Or the superficiality of a second rate student who was not well versed?....after the manner of many mistakes found among those superficial second-rate students, and certainly among those rural memorizers who were not familiar with the biblical text.  And since they erred in the first place....[they compunded the error.]
 * Teshuvot Geonim Kadmonim, Ed. Cassel, Berlin 1858, Photographic reprint Tel Aviv 1964, 23b.


 * Orthodox scholar Daniel Sperber writes in "Legitimacy, of Necessity, of Scientific Disciplines" on this very issue, noting many classical and Orthodox sources who engaged in the historical (also called "scientific") study of the Talmud, and wonders why so many Orthodox Jews are not taught about this. (Sperber has a very good point; since most Orthodox Jews are not taught about this part of the rabbinic tradition, when they do see it for the first time they imagine it is "Reform" or "non-Jewish", while in fact it always has been a traditional point of view.


 * I have even more info on this issue from Orthodox rabbis, but at the moment I literally cannot enter it, as "Talmud Defender" keeps mass reverting every Orthodox source. This is just crazy.

We don't want to have to bring him to formal mediation, but if he continues to remove all Orthodox POVs (except his own ironically non-Orthodox view), if he continues to remove all sourced quotes, what else can we do? To allow cited facts showing a widespread POV to be repeatedly deleted is a violation of Wikipedia policy. RK 23:50, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

In the Talk:Talmud page Shirhadasha writes:
 * I don't always agree with RK, but if these additions are well-sourced they should stay. The issue of non-traditional methods of Talmud study is touchy and controverial, but it has been done from the Modern Orthodox side of the fence and it does have precedent, although I understand it is inconsistent with a Haredi perspective. However it is reasonable to point out that there is some controversy about this within Orthodoxy. I'd suggest (1) making a distinction between academic and Yeshiva-style study and POVs, much as there is a distinction between religious/exegetical and academic POVs regarding the Bible, and (2) Discussing the disagreement within Orthodoxy about the propriety of the approach. The historical approach is a minorty and somewhat controversial practice within Orthodoxy and can accurately be discribed as such. --Shirahadasha 21:52, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I have been trying to follow this, but am very confused what the debate is about, exactly. One thing I'm fairly sure about is that Rashi never suggests that something has been deliberately added, merely points out that a certain version of the text is authentic. He doesn't say anything about the reason for the discrepancy. Maybe TD's problem is the suggestion that some copyists have been tampering with the Talmud, which I would agree is unlikely. The fact that there are alternate versions is clearly attested in the Vilna edition itself, which contains the Ba"ch's corrections to the text. Perhaps both TalmudDefender and RK could clearly present their views here, showing (with quotes) exactly what they don't like about the other's version of the article... --Eliyak 01:06, 6 July 2006 (UTC)


 * No one is claiming that there was a deliberate attempt to tamper with the Talmud. I wish that people would not spend time rebutting charges that no one, let alone myself, has made.  The problem with "Talmud Defender" is that he deletes/censors every single view on the history of the Talmud, and then writes false claims, fantastically claiming that this is some sort of modern day conservative attack on the Talmud's legitimacy.
 * We have an obligation to follow NPOV policy, and to following source and citation policy. I am following this very strictly, while Talmud Defender appears to be making this up off the top of his head.  (That's not an ad homenim attack; it is a literal description of his unfathomable behaviour.)
 * In any case, he repeatedly censors all Orthodox views, and inserts his own theories, which appear to be a parody of ultra-orthodox theology.


 * To the above anonymous anons: Please sign all comments with the four tildes ~ so that it can be known who said what to whom and when. Thank you. IZAK 08:18, 6 July 2006 (UTC)


 * This is why I would like to see a clearly stated argument by him - so that if he has a valid reason for what he is doing, it can be incorporated into the article, instead of him simply changing the article without giving any real explanation. I was hypothesizing that he might dislike the following paragraph, which he has been removing:
 * From the early medieval era, when Rashi first began noting that some statements in the Talmud were actually insertions from later editors, the historical study of the Talmud has been a continuing strand in Talmud study in the Jewish community.
 * I don't really know if this is part of his problem, or something else entirely...--Eliyak 15:43, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Administrator help for Talmud Article
Perhaps an Administrator could take a look at what seems to be a revert war between User:RK and User:TalmudDefender.--Shirahadasha 23:41, 5 July 2006 (UTC)


 * There is no revert war. I am not doing reverts.  Talmud Defender is single handedly reverting censoring every citation from classical rabbinic and Orthodox sources, from the responsa, from classical rabbis, etc.  He seems to have a visceral hatred of any view that differs from his own theory, which appears to be a parody of ultra-Orthodox thought.


 * Note: Please sign all comments with the four tildes ~ so that it can be known which anon is saying what to whom. Thank you. IZAK 08:22, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Request for mediation
RFMF

I have been making edits on the Talmud article for years, and I take great care to research this subject in depth. In recent days I have made great care to cite articles from Modern Orthodox scholarly publications, and offer a variety of quotes from experts on the Talmud from many historical eras. Every single piece of information is cited and sourced in accord with our policies. RK

In response User:TalmudDefender has been a one-man revert machine. He deletes every single reference, with no justification. He makes insults and personal attacks. He then writes absolutely false statements, and inserts them into the article (e.g. his false claim that historical study of the Talmud never existed until the modern era, and was invented by Conservative rabbis.) TalmudDefender's false claims are not only egregious, but they are also totally unsourced.

In the last few hours the situation has become much worse. "Talmud Defender" is now making false accusations of lying and academic dishonesty. I have the actual books and articles on this subject, all from Orthodox writers, with me as I type this. Yet get this - "TalmudDefender" now claims that these books and articles do not exist!

Talmud Defender then veers into the bizarre; after deleting every citation from Orthodox Talmud scholars, he writes that I "hate religious people". That really shook me up. My own rav was Orthodox, and I study this topic mostly from Orthodox rabbinical sources. There is a chance that he may be suffering from an emotional disorder. Agreeing with Orthodox Jews is not hating religious people! Denying the existence of real books and articles that anyone can get in the library is either a childish prank, or a sign of emotional disturbance. (Books and articles exist, even if someone has a temper tantrum and denies their existence.)

Imagine someone going into General relativity and deleting citations from real physicists, and then justifying this by claiming that the authors of this article "hate scientists." Then this person claims that real, verifiable science articles cited "seem to be coming from his own mind", and are also deleted. We wouldn't allow it there, and we shouldn't allow it here.

This isn't a dispute between how to present different POVs. He refuses to bring forth any citations for his own POV, he accuses me of making up citations (even though I can photocopy these texts and mail them to you!) He ruthlessly deletes every cited source, and then claims that quoting academic sources means that you hate religious people. This is clearly crank or troll behavior, not a difference of views. RK


 * Hi RK: Why aren't you using four tildes ~ so that it can be known when and and at what time you make your comments? You seem to be using the old method of three tildes, but no-one does it that way anymore. IZAK 08:15, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Kapparos
Kapparos, which I rescued from WP:DEP this morning, is in need of sources. Thanks. - CrazyRussian talk/email 15:16, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
 * ugh. And you couldn't rescue it as a redirect to Kapparoth or even Kaparot? :-p  Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk  06:18, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Third Temple
This article seems to have gotten a lot of edits and focus lately from Temple Institute and Evangelical Christian folks. I've no problem with showing pictures of the Temple Institute's ritual objects and the like, but suggest more content discussing the role of the Third Temple in mainstream prayer and thought, as well as some metion of the Temple Institute's many critics, so as not to be wholly focused on these two POVs. I've attempted to add a few stubs on these issues. Also, not clear to me that the Third Temple in Judaism and a "Third Temple" discussed in the context of evangelical Christianity are really the same thing. And I'm in no position to know whether the claims made about the role of a third temple in Christian eschatology represent a mainstream or a minority Christian position, although the current article seems to suggest the latter. --Shirahadasha 17:42, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Attention!
The following articles need a lot of work. Adam and Elohim they do not contain anything of what Chazal says. 203.214.153.235 12:33, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Welcome to Wikipedia, thank you for bringing these articles to our attention. Please understand that many articles on Wikipedia require a lot of work.  The best way to change an article is to click on the edit this page tab at the top of the page, and change it yourself.  Make sure to quote your sources (midrish, talmud, rashi, etc) or it may be removed.  Happy editing.  Jon513 13:37, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Naming conventions for contemporary yeshivas
An important discussion is taking place at Talk:Telshe yeshiva that concerns issues relating to naming conventions for yeshivas. Your comments and observations at Talk:Telshe yeshiva would be very helpful. Perhaps it should become part of a broader discussion here at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Judaism. Best wishes, IZAK 06:02, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Featured article candidates/Yiddish language/archive1
FAC vote underway. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 20:14, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Quoting extant Rabbinic and Sefardic sources
Dear all,

I am involved in a couple Wiki projects about Sefardim, and editors pound me about quoting sources. What is the proper procedure about quoting extant sources, that is books that are no longer in publication and are centuries old. --dramirezg Dramirezg 15:24, 14 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't see a problem, just because there is no ISBN doesn't mean you can't quote it. The title and author should be enough. Jon513 01:37, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Old City of Jerusalem
As some of you are probably already aware, Old City is presently a redirect to Jerusalem's Old City walls, which it probably shouldn't be, but rather than just deleting Old City, I'd rather see an article on the Old City. I'm unsure of how to procede tho, so I'm looking for input here... should such an article be called Old City, Old City of Jerusalem (currently a redirect to Jerusalem, where it is not covered in nearly enough detail) or Old City (Jerusalem)? BTW, when we come up with an answer to that question, I'll need a LOT of help actually writing the article!! :-) Cheers, Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk  21:33, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
 * What do you envision it containing? Jon513 01:39, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Ten Lost Tribes
My garbage detector says Ten Lost Tribes has been hijacked again. I known enough to say that the lead section currently endorses what I believe would be politely characterized as a particular theory; I don't know enough to fix this mess. I assume someone here does. It may be just a matter of reverting to an earlier version, but I don't know if there was ever a decent one. - Jmabel | Talk 03:57, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

new "ugh" article
For those who are familiar with the constant barrage the Baptists attempt to assail Jews with, the "Messianic Jews" section of Dispensationalism will be of particular interest, not only for its hideous POV, but for its obscene opening with a "disclaimer" section, followed by "per the above disclaimer..." Like I said, "ugh". I know too little about dispensationalism to edit the section constructively, but I know when they say that "one will come in his name, unlike our Lord who came in the name of the Father", that there is something very VERY wrong with the NPOV status of the article, and I noticed that hideosity before I realized there's a 6-line [depending on your resolution] "disclaimer" that starts the section out. Ugh. Gag. Hack Hack Hack. Puke. Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk 07:31, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Category:Jewish terrorists
Please vote at Categories for deletion/Log/2006 July 19. --DLand<sup style="color:green;"> TALK 03:43, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

umm
what the 203.158.35.252 15:07, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Hebrew can refer to many things. So when someone types in Hebrew the page directs the user to where he wants to go. Jon513 16:13, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Lakewood Yeshiva
Should it be moved to Beth Medrash Govoha? Vote here: Talk:Lakewood_yeshiva - CrazyRussian talk/email 01:38, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

WikiProject Orthodox Judaism
Welcome WikiProject Orthodox Judaism. Please join if you are interested. Thank you. IZAK 08:42, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Joshua
Joshua needs serious help. 203.217.57.89 20:02, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

The Secrets of Rabbi Simon ben Yohai
what do you make of this? I assum its referring to Simeon bar Yohai. --The Y  mode 00:46, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

gentle reminder
recently, readers have been encouraged to "vote" on a category for deletion and on a page move. The "gentle reminder" is that Wikipedia is not a democracy. Inviting discussion is one thing; encouraging people to "vote" is another, and somewhat misguided. Please keep this in mind when inviting participation. Tom e r<sup style="font-variant: small-caps; color: #129dbc!important;">talk 04:04, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

'Jewish blessings' article needs work
This article needs a serious makeover. For one thing, it is incomplete: Birkas Hatorah, for instance, is very important, and should definately be on this page. There are quite a number of other brachot that we make frequently, that are not mentioned, like birchos haroeh, birchos hanehenin, birchos hashachar and pesukei d'zimra; and many that we make less often like kiddush levana, bris millah, nisu'in, megilla, lulav, shofar, and nacheim, to name a few. In addition, the entire article is very badly organized, (There's nothing particularly wrong with the organizational structure, except that there isn't any.) I think it could use some major restructuring. Perhaps, it could also be split into two or more different articles, such as "Jewish Prayers" and "Jewish blessings", or even to make separate articles about different types of blessings (daily, special occasions, circumstantial...) Perhaps parts of the article could be merged into different articles on the same topic. I'm just throwing out possiblities -- my point is, it needs renovation. --Geshmakster 18:39, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Elijah Ba'al Shem
I made a page on Rabbi Elijah Ba'al Shem of Chelm. I would like some feed back on its contents. I would also like for others to share information they known about Rabbi Elijah. Thanks. (!Mi luchador nombre es amoladora de la carne y traigo el dolor! 21:18, 22 July 2006 (UTC))

Kibbutz
Kibbutz is up for a featured article review. Detailed concerns may be found here. Please leave your comments and help us address and maintain this article's featured quality. Sandy 14:03, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Tractates of the Mishnah
I've been working on the Berakhot article and I intend to get to the others of Seder Zeraim in due time... I'm not sure where to go with them, though, or what style to write in. Should I just state the conclusions of each discussion or should I work in the dissenting opinions? How should I organise the articles? By chapter or by topic?

Thoughts? Ideas? Kari Hazzard ( T  |  C ) 21:35, 25 July 2006 (UTC)


 * While I appresiate the work you have done I think that the current article goes beyond the scope of wikipedia. While I can't find any offical policy related to this External links What should be linked to #5 does refer to "a level of detail which is inappropriate for the Wikipedia article".  This has also come up at Talk:Tzitzit where it was decided that the principle of lo min ha-asui was beyond the scope of wikipedia.  I think that the article should state basicly what each chapter is about and mention any major off-topic discussions.  I don't think we should be doing what shema yisrael has done. Jon513 00:07, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Mhmm... I'm not looking so much for content stuff (I have the text of the tractate), it's more a matter of style and how to write it that I'm RFCing for. Kari Hazzard  ( T  |  C ) 00:40, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I've a much shorter version of the article in my workshop... User:Karimarie/Workshop/Berakhot_(Talmud) Comments? Better? Worse? Kari Hazzard  ( T  |  C ) 01:11, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Better. I think the tone could use some cleanup. Jon513 01:35, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Administrator help needed for Temple in Jerusalem
User:Biblical1 has a added a prominent section called Temple in Jerusalem which claims that the view of two rather colorful academics represents a scholarly consensus about the Temple. The thrust of the POV presented is that anthromorphic imagery in the prophets should be interpreted to mean that they viewed HaShem and the Temple in essentially pagan terms. He has persisted and undone several attempts to soften the viewpoint he is presenting or its presentation as consensus or fact. --Shirahadasha 05:41, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

The Name in a name?
Could you guys take a look at this and see if you can think of any names where it applies? I can't. Gzuckier 12:26, 28 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Indeed, the tetragrammaton shows up in Hebrew names. For example: Yirmiyahu, Tzidkiyahu, Yehudah. --Eliyak T · C 01:23, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Is that considered the same as the tetragramatton, though? I.e., because there is a pronounciation for Yehudah, does that imply that there is a pronounciation for "jehovah"? (PS i'm not arguing even if it sounds like, just want to make sure it's clarified, thanks). Gzuckier 17:15, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Deletion debate
Articles for deletion/Controversial Israeli and Zionist quotes --Aoratos 23:25, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Miriam's Dissappeared
Miriam now refers to a disambiguation page. Unfortunately, the link to the Miriam in the Tanach is self-referential, it's a link to the disambiguation page. If the original content on Miriam still exists, I couldn't find any way to get to it. Is there a way to untangle the self-referential linking, or has the content on Miriam actually dissappeared and in need of reconstructing? If so, what name should the article get since the original now refers to the disambiguation page? Miriam (Hebrew Bible)? Also, there's an article on Snow-white Miriam which refers to the episode over Miriam getting Tazriah (Tzaraath is intended here - JFW | T@lk  10:41, 31 July 2006 (UTC)). I don't why there should be two separate articles since this was simply an episode in the Biblical Miriam's life. Once there is a main Miriam article, I want to propose merging, and it looks like it needs some going-over. (The article's not mentioned in the disambiguation page). --Shirahadasha 03:58, 31 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I have redirected Miriam to Miriam (Bible) (which I assume is the original article), since links to "Miriam" virtually all intended that page, anyway. --Eliyak T · C 04:14, 31 July 2006 (UTC)


 * In the meantime, it seems, SlimVirgin has moved the page back to Miriam. Either way, problem solved. --Eliyak T · C 04:19, 31 July 2006 (UTC)