Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Messianic Judaism/Archive 2

WikiProject Religion
The group indicated above was recently revitalized for, among other things, the purpose of working on those articles whose content is such that the article does not fall within the scope of any particular denomination. To most effectively do this, however, we would benefit greatly if there were at least one member from this Project working on those articles. On that basis, I would encourage and welcome any member of this Project willing to work on those articles to join the Religion WikiProject. Thank you. Badbilltucker 14:50, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

As de-facto retired leader of this project, I don't want to see this project join the Religion WikiProject yet. I open the floor for a vote of registered members of Wikiproject Messianic Judaism. inigmatus 17:32, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Vote will close in 1 month or sooner if all 5 out of 7 members vote:


 * No We don't need our project hijacked by another "parent" project. inigmatus 17:32, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Add me as a Member
Is anyone against adding me as a member for Wikiproject Messianic Judaism?? I sometimes can't offer more than a watchful eye for errors but I think some of you know that I am dedicated to keeping up the page. Rivka 18:55, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Anyone is open to join, of course. :) -- Elar  a  girl  Talk 22:51, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

In a similar vein, please consider me an adjunct member, or friend of the project. As with WP:MAC, I don't have lots of time to devote, but I'll keep my eyes open and help where I can. &hArr; ChristTrekker 22:06, 12 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I like that term, "adjunct member". Mathmo Talk 16:57, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Those vocabulary quizzes gotta come in somewhere! Wheeee! &hArr; ChristTrekker 19:19, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

anti-M bias @ Jewish denominations
References to MJ removed. No rationale other than the standard "MJ is not Judaism and thus doesn't belong here". I believe I made some fair points on the talk page, but of course that doesn't sway anyone. &hArr; ChristTrekker 18:33, 13 February 2007 (UTC)


 * We need more representation on wiki. Try your best to elicit WP:3O and other outside party support. If the public sees that the only opposition to SOURCED Messianic Judaism stuff (like the template) is either antiMJ bias or plain ignorance, then I think we can finally enjoy the fruit of the hundreds of hours of our labors as we see MJ information finally presented to the public in a truly NPOV format. For now, take comfort in knowing that since they haven't been able to refute our sources, they now have resorted to the only tool in their arsenal they do have: VfD nominations and bandwagoning them to completion. We should have a barnstar for those MJ editors who draft appropriately sourced articles but get VfDed by the opposition - maybe a "Messianic Martyrs Barnstar." inigmatus 02:11, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

recreating an improved Template:Messianic Judaism
I know that we're all probably going to be talking about this. I have a development copy in my user space, which I'd started on just before the most recent TfD started. If anyone else is doing this also, may I suggest that you offer the link here so that we can share ideas? I'm focusing mostly on the tech angle. I'll let the community sort out content and style concerns. &hArr; ChristTrekker 15:52, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I've got a small degree of interest in this (I remember voting on the TfD), and I've got a suggestion for the project people here. Might it help to make a summary list of the points brought up in the TfD by the people against it and then make sure the new one ticks as many of those off as possible? Mathmo Talk 16:13, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Great idea. &darr;&darr;&darr; Lookie! &hArr; ChristTrekker 16:55, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

FYI, User:Avraham restored the old talk page to User talk:ChristTrekker/MJtemplate, too. So feel free to respond to any of the suggestions mentioned there. When someone comes up with a finished product, I will replace my dev copy with it, and move that to Template:Messianic Judaism so that the talk comes along w/o having to bother an admin again. &hArr; ChristTrekker 18:40, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

points to improve upon
Please feel free to expand upon these or add to the list.
 * Looks too similar to Template:Judaism - confuses readers
 * Valid concern. At the very least the color scheme should be different.  If we find a better way to organize/arrange the template as well, so much the better. &hArr; ChristTrekker 16:55, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Too big!!!
 * As an "intersection" of Judaism and Christianity, I don't know exactly how we can avoid this altogether. (BTW, does anyone complain that Template:Judaism is too big?)  I did suggest that only elements unique to MJ be displayed all the time, and have other "common" articles hidden in an expandable area.  I've started to work on this, but it doesn't work quite as we need it to and I have not been able to contact the person that maintains the expandable-section code. &hArr; ChristTrekker 16:55, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
 * BTW, that is User:R. Koot, so if anyone knows of a good way to reach him... &hArr; ChristTrekker 18:35, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Links too many articles not central/specific to MJ
 * Very much related to the above point. Of course, the assertion is that MJ is Judaism, so every article from Template:Judaism could be said to belong here as well.  The hide/show solution ought to take care of this as well. &hArr; ChristTrekker 16:55, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Ideas to fix the above points
Even though I feel some of those are not valid reasons for deletion.... lets fix them up anyway. Changing the colour scheme is a great start (as is hide/show). As for the "problem" with being the "intersection" of Judaism and Christianity, I suggest the template gets divided up into three sections. One specific to Messianic Judaism, another Judaism, and the 3rd to Christianity. Then put each article into one of those sections of the template, that way it is clear what angle they are coming from. If it is coming from the Jewish side of things, it gets put in the Jewish section, if it is coming from the Christian point of view then it is put in that subsection. And then only those which are specifically only from Messianic Judaism gets put into their box. This way you can cover a lot of the broad scope of Messianic Judaism (that covers areas from Judaism and Christianity) by clearly labelling the articles in the template. Mathmo Talk 17:08, 14 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Just took a look at the current template to remind myself of what it looks like. Basically what I'm suggesting is change from grouping it according to subject to grouping by the primary focus of the article (is it Jewish, Christian, or MJ?). Mathmo Talk 17:11, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
 * This approach fails in one important regard. Though MJ lives at the intersection of Jewish and Christian religious thought, the expression is unified.  It's not like you take a chunk of J and a chunk of C and bolt them together.  (An outsider may see it that way, so it's an easy step to make.)  To treat it as if it's nothing more than that is disrespectful of the religion.  There's no reason it shouldn't be sectioned like any other religious infobox, with theology, history, topics, groups/persons, etc. &hArr; ChristTrekker 17:36, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not saying that it is J and C bolted together (I do have a better concept of it than that). But this did seem to me like the best way to overcome other people's objections. Is ok if you don't like my idea, is merely a suggestion. If you have something better which will end up working and surving then lets hear it and use that instead! Mathmo Talk 19:14, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Seal Image Issues
Just a freindly reminder, the image that is used in all of these templates does not have a proper use tag applied. If it is truly PD, we need some sort of corroboration by the author/creator. If it is one of the members here, they should use one of the appropriate templates that can be seen on Image:MessianicSeal.gif. If it is a fair-use license, then there will be issues using it anywhere but article spaces, meaning it should not be used in userboxes or templates. The same thing happened to the casualty actuary userbox, by the way, in that the CAS seal had to be removed since it is wiki under a fair-use license. Just a heads up that one of y'all may want to take care of this before it becomes a bigger issue that requires deletion. Thanks! -- Avi 18:49, 15 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks for warning us of the next VfD. Do you guys ever get bored chasing MJ stuff off Wiki? The seal goes back 2000 years. inigmatus 22:38, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
 * No need for the attitude, Inig. The question whether or not this particular rendition of the image has copyright issues is fair. &hArr; ChristTrekker 23:15, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Inigmatus, your lack of WP:AGF and your personal attacks are getting out of hand. Please reread WP:CIVILITY and WP:AGF. The age is irrelevant as CT points out, it is this particular image. -- Avi 02:05, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
 * As an aside, any editor would be complete within their rights putting that seal ob VfD without dropping a line here. I try and do you a courtesy so that you won't have the aggravation of seeing it deleted one day, and what do I get back? Well, where I come from the term that comes to mind is kafui tov. I hope that you can eventually see past your frustration and engage in building the encyclopedia. -- Avi 03:26, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

We have a problem
Per http://fp.thebeers.f9.co.uk/messianic_seal.htm, this may be a recent creation (circa 1967) and passed off as an archeological relic--in other words, a forgery, and could not be the seal used at the time of Jesus. Please read the article, and let us discuss. -- Avi 04:50, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


 * On a related note, see my comment on image talk page. Also, I'm sure that if we asked one of the messianic groups who use the symbol if they would release one of their images into the public domain or GFDL I'm sure they'd say yes. JoshuaZ 04:59, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


 * That would solve the wiki copyright issues. -- Avi 05:06, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I've sent them an email asking permission to use there version. It appears to actually be slightly different than the one we have here, so if they give permission, I'd advocate deleting the current image and uploading their version. JoshuaZ 19:55, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Consensus about naming.
Ok, we need to get some sort of consensus about naming, such as uses of "Yerusalayim" "Yeshu" "Yeshua" etc. As far as I am concerned I understand that the messianic editors feel very strongly about using the hebraicized names, but this is the English Wikipedia and we use English names here. The Orthodox, Conservative, Reform and Reconstruction don't have any choice in the matter either. Thoughts on this matter would be welcome.


 * The way the parent article handles it seems reasonable. The English term Jesus is used, except at the very beginning where after introduction, the term Yeshua is linked to. -- Avi 03:27, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I'm fine with that sort of thing for Yeshua. However, that doesn't mean that we should do that for less important names. So for example, Abraham not Avraham. JoshuaZ 03:30, 16 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Agreed, as per article Abraham, although the hebrew is Avraham (as is my name :) ). Good point. -- Avi 04:45, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Template:Messianic Judaism
Not to point out the obvious, but I'm asking for a consensus response to the pre-development discussion on the empty template's talk page. This is a notice to Avaraham, Kendrick, IZAK, and others (as we all know they watch this project far closer than even our own members do) who were involved in the deletion of the previous template so as to force discussion on the new template's development and achieve true consensus rather than unsubstantiated charges of POV pushing. inigmatus 06:15, 20 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I've already responded there [[image:smile.png]] -- Avi 07:54, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Template:Wikiproject Messianic Judaism
Our tasklist needs to be re-programmed into the template. Somehow it got deleted when someone modified the code. Is it me, or does it seem like the Religion project people hijacked some of our project templates? inigmatus 17:24, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Memorandum of Understanding
I've created this subproject as a central place to talk about issues on the relationship of MJ within the larger Jewish community on Wikipedia. Hopefully find consensus, and distill how WP policies should be applied in our case, so we don't have to keep hashing the same arguments over and over. &hArr; ChristTrekker 17:30, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

New project proposal
There is a new WikiProject task force proposal at WikiProject Council/Proposals that is being proposed to deal specifically with articles whose content relates to several religious traditions. Any editors interested in joining such a group would be more than welcome to indicate their interest there. John Carter 15:09, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

What "stories" of the Bible merit separate articles?
There has recently been some discussion regarding which "stories" or portions of the Bible merit having their own articles. For the purposes of centralized discussion, please make any comments at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Bible. Thank you. John Carter 13:47, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Should we delete this list
Some people are selective they would like to see only lists of their own domination, what do u think does this list warrant deletion or shoud we let it stay?--יודל 13:45, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Black Hebrew Israelites
Are the Black Hebrew Israelites Messianic Jews? Just throwing that out there. If they are, I suppose they should be mentioned in Messianic Judaism. --Eliyak T · C 08:05, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

No they are not Messianic, and they are not Jewish. They are a new religious group from Detroit that believes they are the descendants of ancient Israelites. Some of them now nbelieve on of their number is G-d incarnate. Basejumper2 16:20, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

Oh dear. Alastair Haines (talk) 15:37, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Jews for Jesus article
Hi, the Jews for Jesus article is looking for people who are interested and knowledgeable about the group to help NPOV the article. Right now it is majority criticism, and it needs more standard information. So if anyone can help, just head on over. Thanks. Basejumper2 16:20, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

Greater Church of Israel
I cannot make heads or tails of the article Greater Church of Israel. I am not sure if it falls into this project or not. They seem to mix Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. I would not be opposed to an deletion if it cannot be cleaned up. Jon513 16:10, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Messianic Judaism on talk pages
Friends, we've being talking about you MJ people behind your backs at Talk:Christianity and Judaism Mainly good things or neutral things believe it or not. If anyone feels like dropping in to join us, that'd be just dandy. We have a friendly Muslim background guy, a convert to classical Judaism out of Christianity, a couple of Christians, and some very nice and deeply thoughtful Jewish people. I think most of us are > 40 yo and know how to discuss politely. ;) Shalom Alastair Haines (talk) 15:35, 26 November 2007 (UTC)