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Archive 5 | ← | Archive 10 | Archive 11 | Archive 12 | Archive 13 | Archive 14 | Archive 15 |
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 r talk 03:26, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
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)
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)
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)
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 [ [1]] -- Shirahadasha 13:01, 7 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)
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 expanded Mezuzah significantly... Any comments on the additions? Karimarie 22:16, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
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#Latest in biblical terminology 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)
Timothy Usher ( talk · contribs) and FairNBalanced ( talk · contribs) 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 [2]. 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)
Jfdwolff, it is simply inappropriate to summarize your recent edit to Wikipedia: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)
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)
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)
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)
I have to say I'm not incredibly impressed, Timothy, by your edits to Persian Jews, which seem to consist primarily of deleting text [3]. 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." [4] 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:
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 r talk 06:58, 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)
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)
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)
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)
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!" [5] 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)
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)
Another disagreement on which I am requesting project-member input: Please see Talk:Judaism#Orthodoxy: Founded vs. Maintained. Thank you. -- Avi 22:05, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
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)
not sure these will pique anyone's interest here, but here they are for your consideration:
Cheers, Tom e r talk 06:11, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
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:
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)
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)
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)
A mess. See Talk:Xueta#A_mess. 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)
You might be interested in:
Clinkophonist 19:44, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
Destroy. Please. This is an encyclopedia, not a running Biblical commentary. JFW | T@lk 22:45, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia: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 read and consider my note at Talk:Criticism of Judaism#Flawed premise. Tom e r talk 02:21, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
In Muhammad and in the above-mentioned Criticism of Judaism article, the claim is made that "some medieval Jews" called Mohammed "al-meshuggah"...
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):
which is where we find Stillman's uncited footnote, which says:
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 r talk 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 r talk 01:31, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Asenath Barzani: The article about this alleged female "rabbi" needs some serious reviewing. Thank you, IZAK 05:22, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
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)
does anyone know why there are no [edit] tags on the various sections of the project page? Tom e r talk 03:06, 23 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 talk 23:56, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
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)
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)
Dear everyone! I have created Wikipedia: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)
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)
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)
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)
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:
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)
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)
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)
Hi everyone:
User:msh210 has disagreed with me (see User talk:IZAK#Maftir) 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.— msh210℠ 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#Template: Torah portion Thank you. IZAK 08:25, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
The following were not mentioned by User:msh210 on User talk:IZAK, but should be included here to show their relevance:
The following is copied from Template talk:Torah portion:
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.— msh210℠ 20:56, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
— msh210℠ 18:14, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The template is now non existent.--
Shaul avrom
14:48, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
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)
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.
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 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)
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)
{{ 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
Kapparos, which I rescued from WP:DEP this morning, is in need of sources. Thanks. - CrazyRussian talk/ email 15:16, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
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)
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)
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#Naming conventions for yeshivas. Best wishes, IZAK 06:02, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
FAC vote underway. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 20:14, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
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)
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 talk 21:33, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
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)
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 talk 07:31, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Please vote at Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2006 July 19#Category:Jewish terrorists. -- DLand TALK 03:43, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
what the [6] 203.158.35.252 15:07, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Should it be moved to Beth Medrash Govoha? Vote here: Talk:Lakewood_yeshiva#NAMING_POLL - CrazyRussian talk/ email 01:38, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
Welcome Wikipedia:WikiProject Orthodox Judaism. Please join if you are interested. Thank you. IZAK 08:42, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
Joshua needs serious help. 203.217.57.89 20:02, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
what do you make of this? I assum its referring to Simeon bar Yohai. -- TheYmode 00:46, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
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 talk 04:04, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
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)
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 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)
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)
User:Biblical1 has a added a prominent section called Temple in Jerusalem#Scholarly consensus 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)
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)
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Controversial Israeli and Zionist quotes -- Aoratos 23:25, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
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)
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 5 | ← | Archive 10 | Archive 11 | Archive 12 | Archive 13 | Archive 14 | Archive 15 |
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 r talk 03:26, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
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)
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)
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)
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 [ [1]] -- Shirahadasha 13:01, 7 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)
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 expanded Mezuzah significantly... Any comments on the additions? Karimarie 22:16, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
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#Latest in biblical terminology 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)
Timothy Usher ( talk · contribs) and FairNBalanced ( talk · contribs) 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 [2]. 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)
Jfdwolff, it is simply inappropriate to summarize your recent edit to Wikipedia: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)
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)
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)
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)
I have to say I'm not incredibly impressed, Timothy, by your edits to Persian Jews, which seem to consist primarily of deleting text [3]. 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." [4] 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:
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 r talk 06:58, 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)
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)
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)
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)
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!" [5] 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)
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)
Another disagreement on which I am requesting project-member input: Please see Talk:Judaism#Orthodoxy: Founded vs. Maintained. Thank you. -- Avi 22:05, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
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)
not sure these will pique anyone's interest here, but here they are for your consideration:
Cheers, Tom e r talk 06:11, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
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:
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)
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)
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)
A mess. See Talk:Xueta#A_mess. 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)
You might be interested in:
Clinkophonist 19:44, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
Destroy. Please. This is an encyclopedia, not a running Biblical commentary. JFW | T@lk 22:45, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia: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 read and consider my note at Talk:Criticism of Judaism#Flawed premise. Tom e r talk 02:21, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
In Muhammad and in the above-mentioned Criticism of Judaism article, the claim is made that "some medieval Jews" called Mohammed "al-meshuggah"...
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):
which is where we find Stillman's uncited footnote, which says:
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 r talk 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 r talk 01:31, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Asenath Barzani: The article about this alleged female "rabbi" needs some serious reviewing. Thank you, IZAK 05:22, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
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)
does anyone know why there are no [edit] tags on the various sections of the project page? Tom e r talk 03:06, 23 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 talk 23:56, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
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)
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)
Dear everyone! I have created Wikipedia: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)
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)
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)
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)
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:
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)
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)
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)
Hi everyone:
User:msh210 has disagreed with me (see User talk:IZAK#Maftir) 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.— msh210℠ 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#Template: Torah portion Thank you. IZAK 08:25, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
The following were not mentioned by User:msh210 on User talk:IZAK, but should be included here to show their relevance:
The following is copied from Template talk:Torah portion:
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.— msh210℠ 20:56, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
— msh210℠ 18:14, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The template is now non existent.--
Shaul avrom
14:48, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
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)
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.
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 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)
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)
{{ 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
Kapparos, which I rescued from WP:DEP this morning, is in need of sources. Thanks. - CrazyRussian talk/ email 15:16, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
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)
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)
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#Naming conventions for yeshivas. Best wishes, IZAK 06:02, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
FAC vote underway. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 20:14, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
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)
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 talk 21:33, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
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)
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 talk 07:31, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Please vote at Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2006 July 19#Category:Jewish terrorists. -- DLand TALK 03:43, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
what the [6] 203.158.35.252 15:07, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Should it be moved to Beth Medrash Govoha? Vote here: Talk:Lakewood_yeshiva#NAMING_POLL - CrazyRussian talk/ email 01:38, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
Welcome Wikipedia:WikiProject Orthodox Judaism. Please join if you are interested. Thank you. IZAK 08:42, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
Joshua needs serious help. 203.217.57.89 20:02, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
what do you make of this? I assum its referring to Simeon bar Yohai. -- TheYmode 00:46, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
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 talk 04:04, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
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)
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 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)
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)
User:Biblical1 has a added a prominent section called Temple in Jerusalem#Scholarly consensus 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)
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)
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Controversial Israeli and Zionist quotes -- Aoratos 23:25, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
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)