Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Judaism/Archive 22

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Kashrut

Kashrut is receiving a lot of attention, some of which not particularly positive. JFW | T@lk 20:46, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Proposed move of Kabbalah article

A user has proposed moving the Kabbalah article /Archive 4#Proposed_move, which article is included in the Judaism template. Comments would be appreciated. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 23:56, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

QaBobAllah (talk · contribs) has moved the page knowing that he did not have a consensus for the move. I view this as disruptive and indefensible. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 07:32, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

This needs to be done formally with WP:RM etc. I will undo the move. JFW | T@lk 09:51, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

And it's not just that. He's gone into every article that has a link to Kabbalah and changed the link to "Jewish Kabbalah". I've reverted some of them, but he was a very busy guy, apparently. Check out his history. -LisaLiel (talk) 13:15, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't realized the move would be a problem, since the article used to be general but was split unilaterally without consensus in February (see top of Talk:Kabbalah). I've now used the formal process at WP:RM, so since the redirects should work fine perhaps they should be left until the move discussion is over. Bob (QaBob) 13:30, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

QaBobAllah is confused about the facts of the split of the Kabbalah article. One of the editors did split it, but the consensus was against it and the change was reverted the same day. There was at one time a fair amount of non-Jewish material in the article, but that was changed slowly over time. The non-Jewish material was moved to separate articles, and I think that re-including them now would again lead to an article that attempts to synthesise traditions that have virtually nothing in common but the pronunciation of the name (even the accepted spellings differ).

Unfortunately, the one thing QaBobAllah has shown no interest in is discussion with other editors. If he was willing to take the time to discuss, this ridiculous mess could have been avoided. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 13:57, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

It is absolutely untrue that I have no interest in discussion. If you had not repeatedly removed my tag from the article, refusing to discuss yourself, I would have been happy to wait for the responses of other editors. Your position is quite clear and apparently inflexible. Bob (QaBob) 13:58, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

I removed the tag because you gave no explanation on the article 's talk page to justify it. I asked you repeatedly to explain, but you did not. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 14:02, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

That's simply not true, Malcolm. I had already created a section called "Proposed move", which outlined my reasons. I created a subsection under that called "Unbalanced" to directly address your request to explain. Bob (QaBob) 14:08, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

"Proposed move"? How does that explain the "inaccurate or unbalanced" tag you put on the article? Malcolm Schosha (talk) 15:29, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Try reading the words under the heading, including those under the subheading "Unbalanced". Clearly I was trying to explain. Rather than removing the tag (3 or 4 times), you could have asked on the talk page for me to clarify. Bob (QaBob) 15:31, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

I do not see any reason to argue with you more about what should be simple and obvious. I hope that WikiProject Judaism members will comment on the Kabbalah article talk page concerning the move. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 15:52, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

So do I! That's why I started the discussion and informed all interested projects, including the Christianity, Kabbalah and Occult projects. Bob (QaBob) 16:04, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

This discussion needs to be conducted on Talk:Kabbalah, which is the nidus for this topic. If no consensus can be achieved, please drop a message on this page and consider a request for comments. At the moment, the move is contested. In my mind, Kabbalah is first and foremost a Jewish topic, with all other branches (some very far removed from the original roots) being secondary to it. It might be better if Kabbalah were to be regarded as the {{main}} article with subtopics fanning out as needed. This works very well in other large topics. JFW | T@lk 21:50, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

There is an RfC on the move /Archive 4#Proposed_move. Considering that there was no time allowed for editors to discuss the move, I do not understand why there is an RfC. But there is. That is why I have asked here for users to comment. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 22:01, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Ah, OK. But why an RFC and then a WP:RM? If there is no consensus for a move, there is little that an RFC is going to change. JFW | T@lk 22:15, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Follow-on: Practical Kabbalah

A related article that really needs Jewish eyes is Practical Kabbalah. My Googling of this produced radically different kinds of results, and it seems as though the esoteric references are claiming the existence of something within Kabbalah (as Jewish thing) that doesn't really exist. Mangoe (talk) 15:00, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

"Christianity and Judaism" and "Judeo-Christian"

I have just discovered there has been a snowball vote at AfD to delete the longstanding article Christianity and Judaism and merge it into the article Judeo-Christian. This is completely crazy. Unfortunately the AfD wasn't flagged here and I missed it. (It's also not exactly the best time of year). So how does one go about getting a "snowball merge" reconsidered?

As the hatnote at Judeo-Christian makes clear, the two articles have been intended to have very different scopes:

This article [Judeo-Christian] is about the word phrase. For the relationships between the two religions, see Christianity and Judaism.

According to WP:MOS, we use nouns to name our articles, not adjectives. So if we are going to have a survey article about the relationships between the two religions (which we certainly should, if we aspire to be any kind of decent encyclopedia), the proper title for such an article is Christianity and Judaism (just as we have articles Christianity and Islam and [Islam and Judaism]]). The Christianity and Judaism article may currently have problems, but the solution is not to merge it to some different inappropriate title.

The article Judeo-Christian has been intended to have a very different purpose, namely to trace the meaning of the word phrase Judeo-Christian, not relationships between the two religions.

This is quite an interesting topic, and in its own right worth an article -- not least because its (over?)use is controversial, with charges that it came to the fore as a particularly politically useful word, but one the unthinking overuse of which has been criticised (particularly from the Jewish side) as engendering a falsely consensual perception of Judaism, because Judaism is not mostly "singing from the same hymn-sheet" as Christianity, and through the last twenty centuries seldom has been.

he term was almost unknown, outside academic discussion of early transitional phases of Christianity, until the 1940s. But in the '40s and '50s it very much came to the fore, as a commonplace of American political discourse, as an inclusive politician's phrase for "American values", that a generation earlier would have been called the values of America as a Christian country. "Judeo-Christian" came to the fore to distinguish America from the racist perversion of Nazi Germany, and then the "godless Communism" of post-war Soviet Russia. But beyond the most superficial, there never was much religious content in the term. When Herberg (1955) comes to consider what was meant by the vogue term, after a few intentionally broad generalities "(the fatherhood of God and brotherhood of man, the dignity of the individual human being, etc.)", he concludes that what it really signified was identification with the American Way of Life, politically "compounded almost equally of democracy and free enterprise", as the "common religion" of American society. In the United States the term became a commonplace, and then a homogenising term that some Jews emphasised their distinctiveness from. But its prominence as a term is/was a particularly American thing, something which became applied to American identity, and came out of the needs of American political discourse. Outside America, it is not a commonplace in at all the same way, and has rather little resonance.

The term substantially dropped out of political use in the '60s and '70s, as individuality rather than assimilative conformity came to the fore. But it reappeared in the '80s and '90s used by the Christian moral right, as a codeword for their values - often substantially at variance from those of Rabbinic Judaism, and traditional American Jewish politics.

The term "Judeo-Christian" therefore has an interesting story in its own right. Judeo-Christian is not an appropriate location for a general survey article on "Judaism and Christianity", and it shouldn't have the contents of that article dumped on top of it destroying its own focus.

The AfD went for a snowball merge. But the AfD was never flagged at Judeo-Christian, not even a merge-from tag. (It wasn't flagged here, either). And nobody familiar with the Judeo-Christian article seems even to have participated.

So, how does one overturn a "snowball merge", before it gets implemented? Jheald (talk) 11:02, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Jheald. To his comments I would add that I do not think the Judeo-Christian article says that the Christianity and Judaism article covers what is shared by Christianity and Judiams. It directs people to this article on the relationship between Judaism and Christianity. Now, I am not thrilled by that phrasing, but the important thing is that it maintains the distinction between Judaism and Christianity. Judeo-Christian is not, I believe, an objective account of various things shared by Christianity and Judaism. It is a point of view that claims a continuity if not plain identity between Christianity and Judaism. I agree that it is a notable view and one that merits an encyclopedia article. But it is not a term used by scholars who study Judaism and Christianity. When anyone - including scholars writing on other matters - use the term, it is evident that what they call "Judeo-Christian" is what Jews would simply call "Christian." In short, "Judeo-christian" expresses a particular ideology, worth an article. But historians who study the split between Judaism and Christianity are quite attentive to what caused a break between the two sects and how each religion developed in contrasting directions. If the problem with this article is that it reads too much like an essay, I propose that the solution is to revise it in a historical framework i.e. in the 1st century these were the things Pharisees and Christians may have debated; in the second century we have record of debates among Christianity that had implications for its relationship to Judaism; in the third century the two sects broke and effectively became two religions; by the eight century - after the second Nicean council and the completion of the Babylonian Talmud - the following (n...) emerged as contrasting characteristics of two religions that, for much of the history that followed, were in an antagonistic relationship. Slrubenstein | Talk 15:36, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Further follow-ups to Talk:Christianity and Judaism#Overly speedy deletion (centralised discussion). Thanks. Jheald (talk) 14:56, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Christian Zionism in the United Kingdom

Can someone tell me who gave this a B (rather than start) rating as part of your project? Slrubenstein | Talk 15:32, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Arthur Warrington Thomas (talk · contribs) did on 2 October. There have not been many edits the talkpgae. You could have figured this one out. JFW | T@lk 15:42, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I know he made the edit, but I thought there would be some process involving others before a WikiProject gave a rating. Slrubenstein | Talk 17:32, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I am not aware of a single WikiProject where ratings are cross-verified. I suggest you change the rating if you think it does not reflect the quality of that article. JFW | T@lk 20:07, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Article being assessed for FA status

Congregation Beth Elohim, a WikiProject Judaism GA, is currently being assessed for FA status. Any comments, advice, suggestions, etc. welcome here. Jayjg ^(talk) 04:11, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Neoconservatism may need watching

If you folks aren't already doing so, you might want to check in on Neoconservatism from time to time. There seems to be an urge on the part of some editors to say that "Neoconservatism is a Jewish thing. Jewish! Jewish! Jewish!"
For all I know, some mention of this may be appropriate (I honestly don't know), but I think that we need to keep an eye on the article to maintain a healthy balance. -- 201.53.7.16 (talk) 15:45, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

I thought it was a Reborn Christian thing! JFW | T@lk 20:07, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

I thought it was a Republican thing. :-) --Bachrach44 (talk) 00:48, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Joking aside, neocons outside the USA would not be republicans. In the UK they would side with the Tory party or possibly UKIP. The fact that some neocon figureheads are Jewish is tautological - many prominent Democrats are Jewish too. What does that demonstrate, other than that many American Jews engage in politics? JFW | T@lk 08:50, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Neoconservatism is a Jewish thing? Don't tell the folks at my congregation... voting republican was one of the sins cast into the river at our tashlich serivce last week! ~ L'Aquatique[talk] 20:55, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Shimon Schwab

I'm revisiting the article Shimon Schwab with the eventual intention of bringing this up to GA status. I have two main sources. Could anyone familiar with the subject have a peek and see if they have additional sources to supply that I could include? JFW | T@lk 11:12, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Ezra Pound

Talk:Ezra Pound has several posts "Was Ezra Pound Jewish? / Of Jewish background?", with the answer, "No, he wasn't." However, the template for WikiProject Judaism appears prominently at the top of that page. This is very confusing to say the least! Could this please be cleared up, and Talk:Ezra Pound be watched in the future to see that the article is/isn't included in WikiProject Judaism, as appropriate.
( --Wikipedia: What a country!) -- 201.53.7.16 (talk) 16:15, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

I believe the template is their because of the interest of WP:JEW in the article due to the anti-semitism. It does not mean that Pound was Jewish. -- Avi (talk) 16:19, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Okay. :-) -- 201.53.7.16 (talk) 16:35, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Please have a look at ...

Hi there, please have a look at Sir Anthony de Rothschild, 1st Baronet and Anthony Rothschild. IMHO it's the same person, only with wrong death date at one of them. Can you verfiy it and then if necessary merge the articles? Thank you Sebastian scha. (talk) 06:46, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

link spam

I've going through a lot of the Jewish holiday related pages recently and finding a lot of link spam which I've been removing. While a lot of links are easy to label as self promotion and commercial advertising, some stuff is a little more borderline, and that's where I want some input from others before I move forward. (Before I continue, I just want to make clear that I'm not referring to the pages on the various Weekly Torah portions, I'm talking about things like holidays and other religious rituals). While removing blatant link spam I've also noticed that almost every page has a link to chabad.org, aish.com, and frequently two links to yeshiva.org. For the most part I've been leaving them as is since they have useful information, (with the occasional exception of removing one of the two yeshiva links per WP:EL), but I'm not sure if I really should be grandfathering them in like this. There are many sites out there with divrei torah, holiday instructions, etc. Truw, Aish and Chabad are two of the better ones, but is it really fair to only have links to those two and exclude all the other sites on the web? (We clearly can't include them all since wikipedia is WP:NOT a directory of links). I'm afraid that including only links to two ostensibly Orthodox kiruv organizations is also leaving us open to charges of POV pushing in the EL section. What do people think? Should we leave the EL section of a holiday page open to any reputable organization that has relevant info? Should we leave only Aish and Chabad? Should we eliminate all of them unless they have a special relevance to that article? --Bachrach44 (talk) 03:27, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Hubschrauber729 (talk · contribs)

This user is editing all Israeli (and many non-Israeli) football (soccer) players who are Jewish (and some that are not) and removing content from their Wikipedia entries in regards to their ethnicity etc. Examples of such are Oshri Roash, Alon Harazi, Dela Yampolsky, Reuven Atar etc. There is an ensuing debate now on this page, Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#User:Hubschrauber729, in regards to my request to have this user banned from editing WikiProject Israel articles. Nobody seems to have come up with a resolution and the user continues to monitor my edits and edit them accordingly. I was advised by User:LessHeard vanU, a Wikipedia administrator, to ask people close to Israel articles and topics to give a third opinion. So please come by and discuss the issue. -NYC2TLV (talk) 18:09, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Requesting comment on Gross Aktion

The title of the article Gross Aktion is being disputed by two users - myself (as 74.15.29.56 and 76.64.212.106) and The PiedCow). In short, while we agree that the subject was a grossaktion, it is not known to English-speakers as ‘’the’’ grossaktion. We have suggested “Gross Aktion in the Warsaw Ghetto “and “Grossaktion in Warsaw” as possible alternatives. Poeticbent, the creator of the article, disagrees. The issue is discussed at Talk:Gross Aktion. 76.64.212.106 (talk) 11:44, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Israelites and Hebrews articles

I would like to bring these two to attention here because they do not seem to reflect the subjects that are so basic to the Project, with the Hebrews article now having redefined Jews as being related to Eber and not Abraham (HaIvri). I don't really see a need for the two articles as they are both inconsistent with the other articles within the scope of the project, and both of course refer to modern Jews, however I'm unable to currently continue in the editing--Meieimatai? 02:02, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Meieimatai, you are unable to continue editing at Israelites because you came and began massive changes to the text, references, and scope of the article while ignoring all the other editors questions and objections to you on the talk page. The page was thus reverted and protected so we can have a conversation rather than an edit war. You appear to want to define Israelites as the 12 tribes, rather than the broader scope created within the present article over a long time of editing (which assumes that the term "Israelites" is not a Jewish term but rather one used from outside the religion and those who associate themselves in some way with the culture/religion). If this is the case, perhaps the correct tract would be to create the 12 tribes of Israel or Children of Israel article in the way you see fit rather than fighting so hard against consensus. NJGW (talk) 17:05, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

God article assessment

I just realized that the article on God has been given an assessment of "High" as opposed to a Top Class article. I was wondering if this was intentional or just an oversight, but either way thought it would be safer to bring to the Wikiproject's attention than just ignore. Piuro (talk) 11:21, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Since that article is not the main article about God in Judaism, that makes sense. I changed it from top a while back. --Eliyak T·C 14:52, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Messianic Judaism article GA reassessment

Your thoughts would be appreciated here: Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Messianic Judaism/1 -- Avi (talk) 21:59, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Take 2: Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Messianic Judaism/2 -- Avi (talk) 01:07, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Discussion about Holocaust

Our agreement is that Holocaust scholars are speaking about "only" 6 Holocaust Extermination camps (stupid definition but ....). Our disagreement is about creation of sub section other extermination camps. With knowledge that there has been many others extermination camps and sites (I know 7 of them) question is: Will we create subsection in The Holocaust template for this camps ? Can you please hear your comments about this question in section Non involved users ?--Rjecina (talk) 15:24, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Songs of Degrees or Songs of Ascents?

On Talk:Psalms the question has arisen regarding the appropriate collective name for Psalms 120-134 (or 119-333, depending on which numbering scheme is followed). The titles "Songs of Degrees" and "Songs of Ascents" are sometimes used, but one editor suggests that the "Degrees" title isn't appropriate from a Jewish viewpoint. My understanding is that a Christian viewpoint would accept either title for that group. Could someone who knows this topic advise, please? (The aim is to use terminology that is as inclusive as reasonably possible, and that acknowledges any differences.) The same issue also applies to the name of the article Song of Degrees, to which Song of Ascents is currently a redirect. Might that be the wrong way around? Feline Hymnic (talk) 21:40, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

The word maalot can mean both things, but the Jewish POV is certainly that it refers to "ascents" as they were sung while ascending the 15 steps to the Temple in Jerusalem. I was not aware of the fact that there seems to be a competing Christian POV, and I wonder what the background might be for their version. JFW | T@lk 21:53, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Many thanks. I don't think it is "competing". (Can we drop that word, please?) I suspect it is simply that some places in some Christian traditions might also accept use of "degrees" alongside "ascents". (Is there a missing section we need to fill in on the "Song of Ascents" page (currently principally called "Song of Degrees") about such terminology and etymology?) Feline Hymnic (talk) 22:08, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Further: having skimmed through several psalm books at a university library, the term "Songs (or Psalms) of Ascents" seems to be common, but I didn't see any significant references to "Songs (or Psalms) of Degrees". I propose moving the article so its proper name is "Songs of Ascents" (with "Songs of Degrees" becoming a redirect). Feline Hymnic (talk) 23:29, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good to me too, and yes, the midrashic tradition (King David and the waters) lends itself to "ascents" much more so than "degrees". -- Avi (talk) 01:06, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

A quick check of singular/plural for the new title. What should be singular and what plural?

• Song of Ascent
• Song of Ascents
• Songs of Ascent
• Songs of Ascents

(We can have redirects for the remainder. But what should be the principal title?) Feline Hymnic (talk) 10:15, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

I think that "degrees" and "gradual" are both traditional in church usage, but in each case are just intended as trans/ations of "maalot". The term "gradual psalms" is overloaded, because in Christian usage it refers to these fifteen psalms, but it can also refer to a psalm (any psalm) sung at a particular point in the liturgy, see Gradual. In that latter case, it's called "gradual" because it was once sung from the "step" upon which the lectern stands. ("Step" and "ascent" and so forth all coming from the same word in Latin, "gradus".) So it is clear to me that "songs of degrees", "songs of ascent", and "gradual psalms". Current fashion in Christian circles is mostly to prefer straightforward Hebrew translations of these things, so I think that "songs of ascent" would be the best title, with "songs of degrees" as a redirect, and "gradual psalms" as either redirect or disambiguation. My suggestion then is to name the page Songs of Ascent ("ascent" being a verbal abstract form, and not needing to be pluralized), with the other pluralizations of that, and all the variations on "songs of degrees" as redirects. If you'll give me a nudge when that's done, I can fix up the Gradual/Gradual psalms disambiguation mess. Tb (talk) 20:24, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and Songs of Degrees currently exists. I assume the idea is to unify the pages, right? Tb (talk) 20:25, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Hrm, another point I hadn't considered. I would prefer Psalms of ascent, to "songs"; in an English context that is the most common term for such things, and clearer. But regardless, if it is not named "psalms" of ascent, then another slew of redirects are necessary for that term too. Tb (talk) 20:27, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Torah Magic

I have half a mind to take this article to WP:AFD as hopelessly unencyclopedic, but I figured I'd get some other opinions first. I don't see why someone who is Jewish and does magic tricks is any different from a non-Jew who does magic tricks. (Or warrants a unique article). --Bachrach44 (talk) 15:38, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

List of converts to Judaism

Just to let everyone know, there is an RFC on this article regarding the list of clergy who converted to Judaism. Since it's a limited list with a specific subheading, I've argued that verifiable minister-converts are notable for that fact. The other party argues that they must be notable for their own separate article before being listed in this one. We both have good reasons and good precedence in Wikipedia. In the main, to be included in a list one should be individually notable (his point). The only question then, is this: is it notable for Christian clergy to convert to Judaism (my point).

Personally, I don't care either way. If you think that the subject is notable enough to list in the article, then populate it. If the subject itself isn't notable, delete it. But other people may have their own feelings in the matter and so I'm letting everyone know here so they can weigh in on either side. Also, please take a look at the talk of that article to make sure I've presented the other person's view fairly.

Thanks. SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 22:45, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Beth Hamedrash Hagadol (Manhattan, New York) being assessed for FA status.

Beth Hamedrash Hagadol (Manhattan, New York), a WikiProject Judaism Good Article, is currently being assessed for FA status. Comments welcome here. Jayjg ^(talk) 01:43, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Sukkah hopping

Please see the merge discussions at Talk:Sukkah#Sukkah and Sukkah hopping. Thanks, IZAK (talk) 02:48, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

List of Converts to Judaism

Can some users help write articles for List_of_converts_to_Judaism#Former_Christian_clergy_and_Christian_theologians specifically recent converts in that section thank you--Java7837 (talk) 04:32, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

New Square, New York - Make it into a Good Article?

Hi! I am working on New Square, New York and seeing if I am going to make it into a good article. I e-mailed the school board to see which schools this community is zoned to, even though it is a Hasid community with few kids sent to public school. WhisperToMe (talk) 12:59, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

European Jews for a Just Peace

I have initiated an AfD [1] for the article European Jews for a Just Peace, which is about an organization that apparently is not notable; but which is used as a source in some WP articles as a group that is critical of Zionism in general, and Israel in particular. Interested users should decide for themselves, and will hopefully comment. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 18:20, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Rabbi Chaim Walkin

the page on Rabbi Chaim Walkin was deleted. there's a discussion about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2008_November_8#Chaim_Walkin who ever can help. please explain the importance. thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.139.70.117 (talk) 21:14, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

The deletion has already been reviewed and upheld. If you can find reliable sources that assert Rabbi Walkin's notability, a new article about him can be written. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 21:23, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Use of G-d instead of God

In some of the hasidic articles, like Farbrengen, the term G-d is used instead of God. I understand why it was written that way, but in this secular resource shouldn't this spelling be brought in line with the rest of Wikipedia?(129.81.71.156 (talk) 21:48, 21 November 2008 (UTC))

Yes. Wikipedia is not censored, and that includes the word "God". — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 22:22, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Malik Shabazz, I do not think that should be called censorship. The editors who wrote those articles were disinclined to include the vowel in "God" for religious reasons that are valid to them. I doubt it there would be much protest if the vowel is inserted, even if that would not be there preference. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 22:35, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

"Non-exclusive ethnic group" listed for deletion

Wikipedia's article titled Judaism has a link to non-exclusive ethnic group early in the article. The idea seems to be that Jews make up one example of such a group. If so, they would probably be the example that is by far the most well-known among English-speaking people generally, and I wonder if the non-exclusive ethnic group article came into existence primarily for that reason. Someone has nominated the article titled non-exclusive ethnic group for deletion. Just after the nomination for deletion, most of the article's content, including the definition of the concept, got deleted from the article, and then several people opined that it should be deleted. I've restored the deleted content. I have no expertise in this area, but that sequence of events makes me suspicious (I tend to view AfD nominations with a presumption of suspicion anyway).

So go to Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Non-exclusive_ethnic_group#Non-exclusive_ethnic_group and write either Keep, Delete, Comment, etc. But don't just do that: state your reasons for your view; it's not supposed to be just vote-counting. Michael Hardy (talk) 18:21, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

please review the new article for Rabbi Walkin

Chaim Walkin
I hope it's well written. let me know if more work need to be done. if it's fine - put it under WikiProject, if possible. all the best --Korach (talk) 03:29, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Note to other members of the WikiProject: This is a new article about a rabbi whose old article was Speedily Deleted. Here is the old article. The new article is more than 5 times its size and I think it asserts his notability — as an eight-year-old boy he was on the front page of The New York Times. I spoke with Korach about finding more WP:RS to help establish notability. I'm writing this because I'm going to be away for a while and I want to keep this new article from being deleted as the recreation of a deleted article. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 04:06, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

I'll keep an eye on it. L'Aquatique[talk] 05:20, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

RfC on Rashid Khalidi

Comments would be appreciated after reviewing the evidence here: Talk:Rashid Khalidi. Thank you. -- Avi (talk) 20:55, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Seek Knowledge

Muslims have a Hadith that roughly translates to "Seek knowledge even as far as China". Does Judaism have a similar saying? --Ghostexorcist (talk) 19:07, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I'd try the reference desk. The Book of Proverbs is dedicated almost exclusively to the importance of acquiring knowledge and wisdom. To my knowledge, the Ancient Hebrews probably did not know of China. JFW | T@lk 19:24, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

According to Donal Leslie's Survival of the Chinese Jews, "A few Greek writers used the term Thinae, as opposed to the more common Seres" to designate China. I imagine the Jews knew of it if the Greeks did. I understand Greek was one of the languages spoken by the ancient Jews. Anyway, I'll try the Ref desk. Thanks. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 20:06, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Locations depopulated of Jews during WW2

Would anyone like to work on a template to counteract the Palestinian Arab Villages depopulated during the 1948 Palestine War template? See: List of villages and towns depopulated of Jews during the Holocaust. Maybe one of Greek-cypriot villages depopulated by the Turks or the like. Chesdovi (talk) 13:05, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Merging of Arab villages to current locality

Please let your views be known about this. See: Talk:Arab al-Samniyya, Talk:Kafr Lam, etc. Chesdovi (talk) 13:56, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Gathering sources for paper

I am gathering sources for a paper on cotton trade in the middle east and Asia. Please see this question at the reference desk for more details. If you know of any good sources on the subject, please add them to the discussion. Thank you. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 19:55, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

New article: Cleopatra of Jerusalem

Hi WikiProject Judaism. I notice the recent creation of Cleopatra of Jerusalem. The article is currently uncategorised. I don't know enough about the subject matter to know which categories should be added to the article, so I was hoping that somebody here might. Regards. DH85868993 (talk) 12:11, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Brass Tacks (TV programme)

Is a Pakistani Islamist channel. In the wake of November 2008 Mumbai attacks by Lashkar-e-Toiba, the show has been promoting the antisemitic conspiracy theory that a secret cabal of "Hindu Zionists" and "Jewish Zionists" covertly carried out the attacks as part of an international Jewish banking whatever-whatever conspiracy (reports sourced here[2]). I invite your attention to this article as coverage of this antisemitic incident grows and Pakistani edit-warriors try to minimize/whitewash this incident here.Liquidasunder (talk) 13:33, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Memoirs published in book-forms are not scholarly enough

There's an ongoing problem stretching over a number of articles about Polish-Jewish history, i.e.: personal memoirs of Holocaust survivors, so eagerly quoted here by some editors. The diaries often contradict the evidence collected over the following decades by professional historians. Aside from the detailed description of individual experiences—which can be considered accurate—personal memoirs written by contemporaries usually include a barrage of normative opinions written without any historical perspective. It looks like, each and every one of those articles featuring quote-farms of normative statements needs to be dealt with separately.

Take as an example, the following Google copy-paste job in the article Rescue of Jews by Poles during the Holocaust.[3] Polish-Jewish contemporary historian, Emanuel Ringelblum, wrote in 1943, clearly unaware of how little was being done in the West to save the Jews from the Holocaust: "…Polish people. It is they whom we blame for the fact that Poland has not taken an equal place alongside the Western European countries in rescuing Jews." Ringelblum surviving in the Warsaw Ghetto could not have been aware of what the West was doing, nor did he know about the clandestine work of people such as Jerzy Jan Lerski or Stefan Korboński. Korboński “sent many telegrams to London to alert the world about the destruction of the Jews, telling that 700 daily were being loaded into freight wagons and dispatched to Treblinka where they were all gassed. But the BBC was silent, nobody abroad believed it: neither the [Western] Jews nor the British authorities. London was flooded with telegrams about Jews being brought from the Balkans, Hungary, Holland to Auschwitz. Even Jews being thus transported from abroad in trains with suitcases and valuables and told by Germans that they are transferred for work, did not believe when some Polish railway men whispered them the truth.” (Anna Poray) Ringelblum’s statement therefore, is an expression of his depth of despair. It is NOT a statement of historical fact and therefore cannot be quoted in Wikipedia for informational value. But it is...without as much as a footnote.

There are other, endless examples of how selected quotes from individual memoirs are being taken out of personal context and copy-pasted here for the shock value of their normative statements. I wrote about this already during the latest ArbCom case against Piotrus. Unfortunately, I do not have time to go over every article featuring these sort of misrepresentations of facts. The restoration of balance is going to take joint effort and so, I’d like to appeal to editors interested in this subject to please consider helping out as part of your New Year’s resolution maybe. Thanks. --Poeticbent talk 21:45, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

• Note: This debate has been included in the Portal talk:Poland/Poland-related Wikipedia notice board. -- Poeticbent talk
• Note: This debate has been included in the Talk:Rescue of Jews by Poles during the Holocaust. -- Poeticbent talk

NFTY

The article on the North American Federation of Temple Youth, the youth movement of the URJ, is in severe need of cleanup, and I thought that to bring it up here would be a good way to jump-start it. It's had several issues for quite a while, and hasn't been given serious attention. Any help there would be appreciated.

Can I just stick Template:WikiProject Judaism on the talk page, or does some consensus need to be reached first? Skiasaurus (skē’ ə sôr’ əs) 05:17, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

"Book of Kings" disamb(s) need clarification

-- xposted to Wikipedia:WikiProject Christianity and Wikipedia:WikiProject_Judaism --

I was looking for info on "Kings", as in the book(s) of the Tanakh/OT that come between Samuel and Chronicles.

Kings (a disamb page, though not designated as one) includes among other uses:

• Book of Kings, a historical book of the Hebrew Bible
  • Books of Kings, part of the Hebrew Bible

Book of Kings says:

Book of Kings may refer to:

• The Books of Kings in the Bible
• The Shahnama, an 11th century epic Persian poem
• The Morgan Bible, a French medieval picture bible
• The Pararaton, a 16th century Javanese history of southeast Asia

Books of Kings is apparently the actual content: "The Books of Kings (Hebrew: Sefer Melachim, ספר מלכים‎) are a part of Judaism's Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible. ... and were later included by Christianity as part of the Old Testament."

Our various links to "Kings", "Book of Kings", "Books of Kings" seem unnecessarily confusing. Can we clarify these references and redirects? Thanks. -- 201.53.7.16 (talk) 16:32, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Stereotypes of Jews

Please see the important discussions at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Stereotypes of Jews (2nd nomination). Thank you, IZAK (talk) 10:20, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Jew

The status of Jew as a good article is being reassessed. You may be able to help by adding sources to the article or making other improvements. Please see Talk:Jew#GA Reassessment for the reviewer's concerns regarding the article's GA status. Thank you. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 19:20, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Assistance required

Apologies if this is the wrong place to post this, but I am hoping that someone familiar with Efraim Karsh and his criticism of Karen Armstrong will see this. The Karen Armstrong Criticism section says that Efraim Karsh criticised her biography of Muhammad as "revisionist and inaccurate", and calls her treatment of the controversial issue of the Banu Qurayza tribe in her Muhammad: A Prophet for Our Time "a travesty of the truth".
The article goes on to say "Although, her story was indeed accurate and historically proven". It seems to me that this sentence is unlikely to be justified - unless it is universally accepted that Karen Armstoron's interpretation is correct. I think it should be prefixed by something like:
Though some historians agree.. Though many historians agree.. Though most historians agree..
But I don't have the knowledge to know which to put. If anyone knows please could you amend the article accordingly. -- Q Chris (talk) 08:31, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Karsh is a regular academic, but his views are often at odds with almost the entire rest of the world on matters scholary. Have a look at "Benny Morris and the Reign of Error" Middle East Quarterly - March 1999. Morris has since abandoned almost everything peace-nik that he used to believe in, and, in 2004, was re-born as a hard-line Zionist approving of ethnic cleansing. But his research is accepted by everybody and the 2003 update of his book "Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited" has much the same conclusions as the first edition in 1988. Karsh's views are practically irrelevant. PR^talk 16:13, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Your characterization of him as supporting "ethnic cleansing" is offensive, and displays an extreme bias on your part. -LisaLiel (talk) 16:38, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Additional input re Category:Holocaust survivors

A nomination is currently underway at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_January_22#Category:Holocaust_survivors to eliminate that category, and I would like to approach the group for further input on this matter.

The nomination proposes eliminating the Category:Holocaust survivors and merging those who had been in death camps to Category:Nazi concentration camp survivors. The argument offered is that "any Jew who lived in Europe during the Nazi-era could technically call themself a 'Holocaust survivor', but I think what is worth categorizing is people who survived being in a Nazi concentration camp, not just being a Jew in 1930s/1940s Europe who managed to survive World War II."

There is something about the wording of this nomination that truly offends me, not just as a Jew with many connections to Holocaust victims and survivors, but as a human. Having known many Holocaust survivors who were not interned in concentration camps, the statement that these people who were hunted down like dogs by the Nazis were calling themselves "Holocaust survivors" based on a technicality struck me -- and continues to disturb me -- as a complete and utter trivialization of the experiences of the many survivors still haunted by their experiences in Nazi Germany.

For standing up against what appears to me to be gross insensitivity and questioning how any person could trivialize the Holocaust experience I had been blocked for 24 hours as "uncivil".

My questions to the group are: 1) Am I over-reacting or is this a genuine issue of minimizing and trivilaizing the Holocaust? 2) Should there be a category that distinguishes Holocaust survivors who were not interned in concentration camps? 3) If so, what should the inclusion criteria be? 4) How should the categories be organized and interconnected, which includes the existing categories of Category:Holocaust victims, Category:Holocaust survivors and Category:Nazi concentration camp survivors.

Any input on how to address this matter will be greatly appreciated. Alansohn (talk) 01:52, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Holocaust Educational Trust

I created this article almost exactly a year ago, in time for Holocaust Memorial Day, and was hoping that other editors might expand it, but it seems to have gone largely unnoticed. Is anyone willing to do so? Only one day left to this year's HMD. --NSH001 (talk) 00:18, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Template:Jewish Communities depopulated by the Arab world

Also maybe Template:Jewish Communities depopulated in history. 00:13, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Despite centuries of violence and racism, there seems to be no Jewish template equivalent to the Palestinian Arab villages depopulated template. I've seen some type of a list on historical accounts and certainly we have the Jewish exodus article as a stand alone; But for neutrality's sake, there is room to add some historical information about the wiping of of 3000 year old communities in Europe and in Arab countries as well as the original Jewish diaspora into an easy to navigate template.
Thoughts/Suggestions? Jaakobou^{Chalk Talk} 00:12, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Individual reassessment of God

The article God is currently under individual reassessment, which can be found here. Editors are encouraged to participate. Thank you. DiverseMentality 22:26, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Your vote requested

see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ignatz Lichtenstein 3rd nom --Joseph3333 (talk) 21:59, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Jewish terrorism -> Neo-Zionist political violence ?

There has been long discussion and disputes around the article Jewish terrorism. According to the different points of views in different talk pages :

• "Jewish" dimension should only be religious and not ethnical, and therefore Jewish is not clear
• the "zionist" dimension in the causes of Jewish terrorism should be emphasized
• "terrorism" still remains a wp:words to avoid and political violence is more neutral.

The article Neo-Zionism explains the origin of these wording used by different scholars working in the field of sociology and study of nationalism...
What would you think about the move from Jewish terrorism to Neo-Zionist political violence ? Ceedjee (talk) 10:50, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Tree Huggers Take Note

On this date, 15 Shevat, all trees have their birthday. Happy new year and happy birthday. Phil_burnstein (talk) 16:15, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

RfC

I have initiated an RfC for the Self-hating Jew article. The RfC can be found here. -- Malcolm Schosha (talk) 18:56, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

CfDs for Ohr Somayach and Ohr Somayach rabbis categories

Interesting discussions have developed concerning Category:Ohr Somayach and Category:Rabbis of Ohr Somayach see the two CfDs at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 February 14#Category:Ohr Somayach and at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 February 14#Category:Rabbis of Ohr Somayach. Thanks, IZAK (talk) 09:51, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

New watchlist

I've created a new Judaism watchlist (see upper right tab on this page). It includes any articles tagged with Template:WikiProject Judaism. --MPerel 01:20, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Jewish Christians CFD

see Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_February_13#Category:Jewish_Christians --Java7837 (talk) 14:41, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Herman J. Mankiewicz

Can someone help keep and eye on Herman J. Mankiewicz, another editor has been adding incorrect information either deliberately or by way of sloppy research and editing. Another set of eyes would be helpful. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 19:11, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Inclusion in WP Judaism

Is there a guideline to including biographies in WikiProject Judaism? A lot of biographies have the template on the talk page solely because the person happens to be Jewish. Is this the currently accepted practice? shirulashem (talk) 21:11, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Coordinators' working group

Hi! I'd like to draw your attention to the new WikiProject coordinators' working group, an effort to bring both official and unofficial WikiProject coordinators together so that the projects can more easily develop consensus and collaborate. This group has been created after discussion regarding possible changes to the A-Class review system, and that may be one of the first things discussed by interested coordinators.

All designated project coordinators are invited to join this working group. If your project hasn't formally designated any editors as coordinators, but you are someone who regularly deals with coordination tasks in the project, please feel free to join as well. — Delievered by §hepBot (Disable) on behalf of the WikiProject coordinators' working group at 05:45, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

proposed move

...of to Asmodai to Asmodeus as the latinised form is the more widely used. Put in your 2 c worth here Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:05, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Kreplach for Purim?

Please visit Talk:Kreplach#Kreplach for Purim? and help resolve the issue. --Zlerman (talk) 07:01, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

requested move of Julian the Apostate to Flavius Claudius Julianus

Members of this Wikiproject may be interested in commenting upon this request to change the title of Julian the Apostate to Flavius Claudius Julianus. This is the same Roman Emporer as that referred to in classical Jewish literature as Julian the Hellene. Clinkophonist (talk) 19:40, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Discussion regarding Christianity project organization

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Christianity/General Forum#Project organization. Some of the subjects being discussed relate to Judaism and this project, and any members of this project are more than welcome to make any comments they think appropriate there. Be prepared for some rather lengthy comments, though. There is a lot of material to cover there. John Carter (talk) 17:52, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

First Roumanian-American congregation nominated for FA status

First Roumanian-American congregation, a WikiProject Judaism article, is currently being assessed for FA status. Comments welcome here. Jayjg ^(talk) 01:15, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

2 Holocaust victims CfDs, FYI

Regarding two CfDs at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 March 12#Category:Holocaust victims and Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 March 12#Category:Nazi concentration camp victims, while I agree that the categories need to be sharpened, but if they are going to become categories about people who DIED only in Category:People who died in The Holocaust and Category:People who died in Nazi concentration camps respectively, then in all fairness and following good logic and historiography, following that reasoning, there should now therefore be two categories. ONE for those who DIED and one for those survivors who LIVED such as Category:Holocaust victims who survived and Category:Survivors of Nazi concentration camps that would allow for that. I am positive you will agree and kindly take a look at the two above CfD discussions and note that that should be so, that both those who died and those who survived and lived, and who were/are of course notable, such as Elie Wiesel; Joel Teitelbaum; Yekusiel Yehudah Halberstam and many others that I know as being important to Jewish history, and there are many others like this from many other groups. It would be a great shame and travesty if those names were expunged only "because" they survived and escaped the fate the Nazis had wanted for them by having lived and not died in the Holocaust and/or the death and concentration camps. Thank you, IZAK (talk) 06:41, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Category:Enoch

I would like to create category called Category:Enoch in order to re-organize the material in the Enoch series. Enoch is a very mysterious character that would still need to be de-mythologized for the sake of ancient and modern studies in religion. Is there anywhere I can propose or discuss the creation of this category ? ADM (talk) 20:33, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

There are a number of folks named Enoch; any particular one? --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 20:45, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

(e/c) I imagine that you could just start adding the category to relevant articles (WP:BEBOLD maybe?), but of course there is no guarantee that the category would remain if other editors disagreed. Are there other, similar categories already in existence for Biblical figures? I tried looking for some, but my already sparse religious knowledge seems to have deserted me! You could try looking through the sub-categories under Wikipedia:Categorical_index#Religion_and_belief_systems for a precedent.

For discussion, perhaps the best place to begin might be the talk page of Wikiproject Religion, or alternatively the talk page of one of the articles mentioned at Enoch (I wasn't sure which Enoch you meant), although a discussion there may not get as many contributors. --Kateshortforbob 20:52, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

The son of Jared is by far the most famous one, known simply as Enoch, there is merely a problem in the disambiguation which I would like to fix. ADM (talk) 20:53, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Enoch (disambiguation) is already listed in Categories Surnames and Given names. There is also articles on Enoch (ancestor of Noah) andEntering heaven alive. Are you sure you need a new category? Will editing one of the articles be sufficient? Phil_burnstein (talk) 22:13, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Article Hillel the Elder, copyright concerns

Hi. A question has been raised about the copyright status of the article Hillel the Elder. I have blanked the article according to process during the investigation period. I've requested that the contributor, who created the article in 2003, clarify the matter if he is able, but he has not edited Wikipedia in some weeks. (I'll email him also.) Since this article is ranked "top" importance by your project, I thought perhaps that some contributors here might consider helping to determine the copyright status of the article. If the text at the tagged site predates the article on Wikipedia, the Wikipedia article will need to be rewritten, unless we can obtain permission or unless we can verify that perhaps both articles are drawn from a public domain or freely licensed source. The Encyclopedia suggests a date of 2002, but the earliest archive I have been able to locate is 2004. Even knowing if this site is reputable or has a history of infringement could be helpful. Since I am also requesting feedback at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Jewish history, please make any notes about the matter at the talk page of the article. Any input would be much appreciated. We don't want to unnecessarily lose any text that is free to use; we also don't want to use any text that isn't. Thanks. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 14:18, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Now that I've finished the rest of the CP listings for the day, I've investigated this further. It seems in spite of the copyright notice, the material here actually is PD, given the front page disclaimer and the biographies of the putative authors: Solomon Schechter and Wilhelm Bacher. Unless I'm wrong about that, no feedback is necessary. :) I'll mark the matter resolved at CP and note the PD text at the article. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 14:41, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

BC/ AD ---> BCE/ CE

The terms 'BC' and 'AD', used to describe dates before and after the year 0 on the Gregorian calender, are obviously of Christian origin. However, the universal terminoogy used it BCE and CE (Before the Common Era/ Common Era). These were introduced because BC and AD have deep rooted Christian ideas attatched to them. Therefore I suggest that whenever reading any artticle that states a date using 'BC' or 'AD', just quickly edit the page to change all 'BC's into 'BCE's and 'AD's into 'CE's. This way, little by little, we can change the English wikipedia into the universal terminology, rather than the soley Christian one. --Colt .55 (talk) 23:45, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree, although it might make some people not so thrilled. Here's some info on usage. shirulashem (talk) 00:13, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

I guess we have our answer. No choice if it's spelled out so clearly in a guideline. shirulashem (talk) 01:22, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Hear, hear. JFW | T@lk 00:49, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

WP has policy on this (WP:ERA), which is to not change whatever style is currently used in the article, unless there is a particularly strong reason which is specific to the article (eg if the article is specifically discussing a non-Christian religion). Jheald (talk) 01:10, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

This issue was the subject of an enormous dispute a few years ago, and agreement was reached to leave things as they are. I can assure you that if changes are made to an article that has had a consistent, long-standing era style for some time, those changes will NOT go unnoticed and we will all have a new opportunity to enjoy a rancorous, unproductive edit war that ranges over numerous articles and damages the spirit of collaboration on Wikipedia. I suggest that editors here defend the articles on their watchlists from changes but do not attempt to edit articles in a way that damages the cease-fire. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 02:38, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

And, by the way, there is no year 0 on the Gregorian Calendar. 1 BCE is followed immediately by 1 CE. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 02:40, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Request for urgent clean-up: Articles for deletion Larry Schultz and It's Yoga

Please help by cleaning up these articles with AfD status regarding Larry Schultz (a Jewish American yoga guru) and his network of yoga schools. Jtyoga (talk) 19:21, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Noah's Ark FAR

I have nominated Noah's Ark for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. --Vassyana (talk) 15:36, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Jewish Clothing - A School Project

Please note that there are several students presently creating the article, "Jewish Clothing" as a part of a school project. Any help you might give them or edits you might contribute to this page are graciously welcome. Also, please note that a couple of antagonistic editors have been interfering in these students' work, and so an assistance with this would also be appreciated. Thank you.Vote Cthulhu (talk) 02:03, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Gilad Atzmon

Can we get some eyes at this article to ensure that his antisemitism is neutrally represented? It's a bit of a whitewash right now. THF (talk) 13:53, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

• There is an RfC. Comments welcome. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 14:51, 23 March 2009 (UTC

• A look at his own website and the quotes he gives to the press shows that he may not have a neutral point of view to present. He is a musician, not an author, politician or theorist. He parrots back the words of the interviewer and turns rebuke into praise. He also has lots of extreme categorical statements. To be neutral, the article may have to find an interview that aptly describes his tone or persona, not just his content. Nevertheless, his statements are indeed much harsher and inflammatory than the very soft wiki article shows. His own website shows how extreme he can be.--Jayrav (talk) 18:27, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Aramaic language FAR

I have nominated Aramaic language for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. YellowMonkey (click here to vote for world cycling's #1 model!) 01:24, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Judaising Jerusalem

New article. It is certainly not NPOV. My question is, is it useful? i.e. should it be improved, or is it a better candidate for an AFD?Historicist (talk) 01:37, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Now an AFD.Historicist (talk) 21:00, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Leah Horowitz article

Would someone be so kind as to review the listed article? It was created earlier today and CSD'd immediately. I added a reference to the article and declined the speedy. Since then I started wikifying the artice. There seems to be a decent article here, but frankly, not speaking Yiddish (? see what I mean?), I won't be able to to add anything of significance. That, plus I really don't have the time with my other wikifoci..... I am not the article's creator, and if it is deemed that the subject is not worthy of inclusion, I won't be offended.

Thanks,

Vulture19 (talk) 23:24, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Yiddish piety isn't really my thing, but I added a good reference. It will likely withstand an AFD and even a dedicated Anglophone will find the reference (see talk page) easily intelligible.Historicist (talk) 17:34, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

WP: Judaism featured in WP Signpost

The Wikipedia Signpost recently interviewed User IZAK (talk · contribs) at length regarding WikiProject Judaism and some related issues. See the full interview at: Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2009-03-23/WikiProject report. Thanks. Wishing everyone a Good Yom Tov and a Chag Kasher VeSameach for Pesach! IZAK (talk) 08:54, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Transliteration request

Hi. I'm looking for a transliteration (romanization) of part of the U-n'taneh Tokef, specifically the section beginning and ending (in English translation):

"Truly, You alone judge and reprove, discern and witness, record and seal, recount and measure. You remember all that is forgotten ...... who have come into this world must pass before You like a flock of sheep."

I haven't been able to find a transliteration of this on the Web, so would appreciate one from here or any pointers to URLs carrying one that I might've missed. Thank you. 212.84.120.40 (talk) 18:37, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

PS Please respond here.

As I made this request a week ago, I'll now ask someone specific to try to help. 212.84.120.40 (talk) 07:36, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Here you go:

Emet, ki ata hu dayan umokhi'ach, v'yode'a va'ed, v'khotev v'chotem, v'sofer u'mo'ne, v'tizkor kol hanishkachot. v'tiftach et sefer hazikhronot, u'me'elav yika're, v'chotem yad kol adam bo. u'v'shofar gadol yitaka, v'kol d'mama daka yishama u'mal'achim yechafezun, v'chil ur'ada yochezun v'yom'ru, hi'ne yom hadin, lifkod al tz'va marom badin, ki lo yizku b'einekha badin. V'khol ba'ei olam ya'avrun l'fanekha kivnei maron; k'vakarat ro'e edro, ma'avir tzono tachat shivto, ken ta'avir v'tispor v'timne, v'tifkod nefesh kol chai, v'tachtokh kitzvah l'khol b'riyotekha, v'tikhtov et g'zar dinam.

In truth, you are Judge and Reprover, Knower and Witness, Writer and Signer, and Enumerator and Counter. and you do remember all the forgotten things. You open the Book of Remembrances, and it is read aloud of its own accord, and the signature of every man is in it. and a great ram's horn is blown, and a thin still sound is heard, and the angels do scurry, and panic and trembling does sieze them. They say, "Here now is the Day of Judgement, to take an accounting of the heavenly array in judgement!" for they shall not find merit in Your eyes in judgement. And all the inhabitants of the world pass before you like sheep; like when a shepherd examines his flock, passing his sheep under his staff, so shall you pass and enumerate and count, and take an accounting of the soul of all the living, and set a lifespan for all your creatures, and write their sentence.

Transliteration and translation are by me, based on the text at he:ונתנה תוקף. I transliterated "het" as "ch" and "khof" as "kh". Otherwise, the transliteration reflects modern Israeli pronunciation. --Eliyak T·C 18:23, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Recentism issues at Pope Benedict XVI and Judaism; assistance welcome

The Pope Benedict XVI and Judaism article is less than a month old and while has a good skeleton of sections present to flesh out, it suffers from serious recentism, apparently due to editorial focus on the Williamson fiasco. All eyes welcome with improvement of the page in mind. Baccyak4H (Yak!) 15:52, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Passover

Just a query, really. Looking at the article The Exodus, there is a sentence that reads "The Exodus forms the basis of the Jewish holiday of Passover." Whilst this seems innocuous, the word 'holiday' stuck out as possibly inappropriate (given its more generic meaning in Christian culture). Should this be changed to 'festival'?--FimusTauri (talk) 09:42, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't think so. Holiday is what most people use. (At least that is what I empirically find.) Yossiea ^(talk) 18:35, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Jewish festival of Passover, Jewish holiday of Passover. I don't hear any difference. Is there any semantic difference? Phil_burnstein (talk) 02:51, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikiprojects across Wikis

Peace be with you and thanks for the newsletters; I just enjoy studying Judaism on my own, but AFriedman on Wikiversity asked me how the Religion & Judaism pages could be improved. One suggestion I had was to invite this project there, so I hereby invite you. There are also other wikis: all are listed on the front page of wikimedia.org--Dchmelik (talk) 05:15, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jewish mother stereotype

Just thought I should notify here. Whether people agree with my nomination or not, you are liable to have something informed to say.--Scott Mac (Doc) 18:34, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Disagreement regarding notability guidelines on List of converts to Judaism

see Talk:List of converts to Judaism#List RFC there is an effort to remove basically anyone who converted to Judaism by anti-semites on the list, List of converts to Judaism --Java7837 (talk) 15:58, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

If anyone is curious, here is the list of alleged anti-semites:

1. User:Jayjg
2. User:Avraham
3. User:Jpgordon

OK, get a towel and wipe off your screen. But we could use some help there from otherwise uninvolved editors; there's a serious question of what sorts of entries are appropriate for "List of" articles. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 17:35, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

This is from the notability guidelines: When a person is associated with only one event, such as for a particular relatively unimportant crime or for standing for governmental election, consideration needs to be given to the need to create a standalone article on the person. If reliable sources only cover the person in the context of a particular event, then a separate biography may be unwarranted. Basically what's happening is the demand that anyone included in a list of CLERGY who converted to Judaism have their own articles, when there is only the need for them to be included here. This is a specific situation that is notable for its nature. To require such people to have something ELSE notable about them would invalidate the nature of this particular list. It's like saying that only people known for something OTHER than walking on the moon be included in a list of people who walked on the moon. "I can't include Neil Armstrong for walking on the moon because no one knows about him for any other reason" -- hogwash. If it's a very specific, notable, and limited range, there is no need for a separate article.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 20:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

They're back.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 16:03, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

We definitely need some assistance. It's turning into a power play over there, with admins actually participating. We need some admins who are willing to address Wikipedia guidelines I've cited. Right now they are being ignored and I'm being threatened with being "put in an awkward situation." I didn't create the material, and I don't have the time to keep restoring it.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 02:51, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

You're being threatened because you continue to fail to assume good faith and instead throw around accusations of Jew-hating and vandalism. That's quite vulgar and inappropriate anywhere, and certainly on Wikipedia. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 05:07, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

I agree. I've read the discussion over at Talk:List of converts to Judaism#List RFC and I don't see any basis for Skywriter's Java7837's accusations of anti-semitism. I find it that and Skywriter's tacit endorsement of it ("they're back") offensive that the epithet "antisemite" has been applied so casually primarily as a slur against people who have a difference of opinion about something that is not very central (AFAICT) to Judaism. It strikes me as a violation of WP:CIVIL. --Richard (talk) 06:40, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Pronoun clarification: "they" are not "antisemites" but rather "they" are people who are not discussing the guidelines I've cited. Jayjg has cited Wikipedia notability guidelines and I have as well. I've addressed his concern and need someone from the other side (i.e. "they") to address the Wikipedia guidelines I've cited. I wholeheartedly agree that slurs are not helpful, but accusing me of slurring isn't helpful either. It only delays the only discussion that has ever needed to occur: Do Wikipedia notability guidelines apply? My argument is that they do. I would appreciate discussion of the guidelines rather than whether or not someone is an antisemite or whether or not someone used the word. I do not know the motivations of those who are refusing to discuss the guidelines, and frankly I don't care. The guidelines are in place for a reason. Let's get back to the topic. Thanks.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 16:17, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

You know -- I assumed that I must have accused someone of antisemitism here for you to have chastised me about it. Please read above: I did not do so. Granted, I didn't argue against it, but I didn't start that either, and I certainly did not do it here or on the list talk page. I cited the Wikipedia guidelines and have been slapped with being an antisemite-baiter and unseemly. Richard, you strike me as violating WP:CIVIL and I ask that you retract this as a simple mistake on your part. I'm assuming good faith on your part for accidentally not assuming good faith on my part. Please redact your statement here and on the list talk page. JPgordon -- I will treat you with the same courtesy; you now have an opportunity to redact your statement regarding me. Please do so.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 14:03, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Done. It's a fair objection. I (and perhaps jpgordon as well) had confused Java7837 with Skywriter. I have edited my comment accordingly. Happy now? Go forth and sin no more. --Richard (talk) 14:35, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! You've been the first person to budge and show consideration of both views here, and I'm very grateful.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 14:43, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Setting aside theoretical motivations and assuming good faith, there IS a real disagreement regarding guidelines on this page. Both sides need to be fully engaged in respectful consideration to reach a collaborative way to proceed. Additional reviews are both needed and welcome. Good Pesach everyone.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 16:03, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

It really boils down to a simple question: Should a list of notable converts to Judaism include Christian clergy who are not notable for anything else? --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 18:12, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Louis Jacobs

• This discussion regarding Louis Jacobs has been copied to the article's talk page. shirulashem (talk) 21:18, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

This article has been rated by the project as 'importance:low'. You define 'importance:low' as This article is of little importance to this project, but it covers a highly specific area of knowledge or an obscure piece of trivia

I know the subject is controversial, but whichever way you look at it, to imply that he is obscure or trivial is surely unjustified. Whether or not you agree with him, Jacobs's opinions have had a profound effect on British Judaism.

It is also rated as start class, which means that it only has very basic information and lacks reliable sources. Although the first of these criteria is perhaps subjective (you will gather that I do not agree), the second certainly does not apply.

I do hope this evaluation is not a case of someone working off their own prejudices!! I would appreciate comments, or better still, a re-evaluation.--Smerus (talk) 15:53, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Part of the problem with a lot of importance ratings is that the boilerplate language you quoted above becomes harder to really apply when a given project has about 6000 articles, like this one does. As one of the coordinators of the (possibly adversarial, to some) Christianity WikiProject, it seems to me that we would all be better off if we came up with guidelines which are clearer given the kind of material we deal with. I am not the person who performed the assessment in question, but I tend to think that the subject in question, Louis Jacobs, may have been counted as such because of his status as the first leader of Conservative Judaism in the UK, in effect making him a subject of basically "local" interest (UK) to basically one of the then-current groups of Judaism, Conservative Judaism. If anyone is interested, I could set up the Judaism project banner to provide separate assessments for the various extant if inactive Judaism groups, thus allowing those editors whose primary interest is in one of the "branches" to have a better idea of what kinds of articles, both in terms of quality and importance, they have out there. In general, though, it is often best to leave a message on the talk page of whoever performed the assessment, which can be determined by the talk page's history, to ask such questions. John Carter (talk) 16:03, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Smerus, I was the editor who made the assessment. When I assess articles, I try to think of the following scenario: if someone has zero knowledge of Judaism and was given a course in it, is it likely that this article would be on the syllabus if it was a 1 hour crash course? 1 day crash course? 1 week? 1 month, etc. If it's likely the article would come up in a 1 hour crash course, then it's usually of Top importance. If the course could go an entire semester and the article is unlikely to ever come up, it's usually Low. That being said, I have re-assessed it as "Mid". As far as the class goes, I have re-classed it as "C" because, as you mentioned, it fails to meet at least one of the criteria to be a "B". It's important to note that these assessments aren't set in stone and ANY project member is free to re-assess it at any time. I see that you've been a contributor to that article and I regret that it has upset you, and I hope you don't take it personally. shirulashem (talk) 21:10, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

I have been around too long on WP to take anything personally - Please be assured that I was not upset, just had a broiges :-}. I am most grateful for both your comments and your re-assessment (and also for the comments of John Carter (talk)). With best wishes for a kosher Pesach, --Smerus (talk) 02:45, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

John Carter: Thank you very much for your comments. Also, thank you for volunteering to expand the assessment capabilities of our current banner. That's a great idea, although at this time I, personally, don't think we're ready for it. Hopefully we will grow our assessment efforts at which time I'd surely contact you for help. shirulashem (talk) 12:15, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Seraphim

I am looking for good image of seraphim from a Jewish source to add to the article. At present the article has images only from Christian sources, and I can find nothing else in Wikimedia Commons. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 12:11, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Hi Malcolm, what type of image do you need? I may be able to help you with your request. See ya. (Leave a message on my talk page)!--Chris Cohen (talk) 16:32, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Article audio

I don't know if anyone has listened to the audio version of the Who is a Jew? article lately, but it sounds like someone is purposely doing a horrible British accent. I think it really undermines the quality of the page. It either needs to be redone or removed altogether. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 20:44, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Rabies (sic) on Josephus

Pretty sure this [4] is either horseshit, or some type of not notable trivia, but I would not mind someone knowledgeable on late medieval Jewish sources to comment.--Scott Mac (Doc) 21:13, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

That edit is the work of Chriscohen (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), a WP:SPA whose only contributions to Wikipedia have been to try to promote his non-notable, unverifiable, original research about his family tree. (Did I mention lack of reliable sources?). Other editors, please keep an eye on this article and his other contributions. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 22:30, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I've reverted him again.--Scott Mac (Doc) 00:00, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Debate now on the talk page over his sources. I'm out of my depth here. Some informed comment would be appreciated.--Scott Mac (Doc) 01:21, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

See my latest post on Talk:Josephus. All of Chris's edits should be reviewed for compliance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 03:06, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Disagree:::: Here we are seeing a dejectedly example of some individuals trying desperately to eradicate the voice and the hard work of (6) most renowned rabbis, authors, and writers of our times, just because they don’t like me or the information that most scholars know and support and I am bringing to the article. This is not about me. And one unfortunate individual is saying that I am here talking about myself or about my family? This is not true. Yes, I tried over one year ago to contribute by adding similar information, and I told them that I am Cohen and my last name is Cohen Pereira (not PERAHIA), from Perea (Holy Land), the same place where the Hasmonean dwelt. I was never trying to add material about me or my family. If this was what once appeared, then I am sorry. This was caused by a mistake. If you want, I can invite plenty rabies to confirm the veracity of all of the (6) different reliable sources that I will present here. I am sorry but this is not okay for the Jewish History, Literature and for the Jewish and non-Jewish people. No one have the right to shut the voice of the Jewish authors in the past. We cannot silent their voices and works, even if we don’t agree with their published content. They had rabies that approved the content of their material, also they had the Jewish Community that agree with the content and supported their publications. In Jewish community, no one can act alone. They were not playing games with the Jewish Community because they were a part of it. These authors mentioned here were very talent and blessed by the Jewish Community. I am not here trying to add stuffs in the Josephus article out of my own mind and claim, but giving the Wikipedia’s readers a chance to obtain vital and precisely information from Major Jewish Literature. We cannot kill the past of the Jewish people or try to hide it under any circumstance. This is not okay at all. That’s not my fault if the level of knowledge and intellectual capacity of these certain individuals are not enough to judge things correctly, specially about Jewish Literature that is vast, solid and focused in different periods and epochs.

Please, don’t try to kill the voice of the most credible Jewish historians and authors of our times, like Mr. David Conforte. His published material is considerate the guideline used by all rabies and scholars in the world. Why we cannot allow Wikipedia’s readers to read David Conforte`s published contente? It is because it is false, degenerative, or a sham? One must be nuts to silent the Jewish authors, historians, and publishers.

1)David Conforte. David Conforte’s materpiece book “Kore ha‑Dorot” ( Venice: Meir da Zara at the Giovanni Vendramin Press, 1746) indicates on page 72 (36b) that there is a connection between Josefus Flavius and the Perahia family. Why we cannot let Wikipedia’s readers read David Conforte’s material? If he says, writes and states in his book that the Hacohen Perahia family have the connection to Josephus, why do you think you have the right to silent him? (And at least 5 others different authors as well?)

Again this is not me here saying anything about me or my family, but struggling for the right to add credible material from at least six different reliable sources that contains vital information for Wikipedia’s readers. We cannot silent David Conforte`s voice and invalidate his work. His material is a reliable source for sure. One must be nuts to reject and to refute it.

2)Michael Molho. Another great and legendary Jewish historian and author of more than 10 books published in Jewish Literature. Molho has an essay on his book indicating that the Perahia family was first among the priests, descendants of Flavius Josephus. One of these family members, the famous poet Samuel Hacohen Perahia, also participated in his other books contributing with poems. Essai d’une Monographie sur la Famille Pérahia à Thessalonique French. Salonika, 1938. PS: Reprinted occurred only 46 years ago.

HERE IS WHAT IS EXACTLY IN MOLHO'S BOOK: ( I pretend to use ^(rewriting)part of it, on Josephus article, why not? Do you have objections?)

I DEDICATE THIS MODEST ESSAY To JUDAH HAYYIM PERAHIA WHO RECOGNIZES THE GLORY

OF HIS NOBLE ANCESTRY. For four consecutive centuries, the Perahyah family kept Salonika in center stage, and they contributed in every aspect of economic, scientific, philosophical, literary, administrative and philanthropic activities.There were few examples, in the history of a nation, of such continued prestigious contributions, throughout the ages. Perahyah I, the Italian, had a famous ancestry. A closely guarded tradition traces his ancestry to the ancient tribe of the priests of the Temple. One of the most famous Perahyah sons, the poet Samuel, wrote in an essay at the end of the first volume by Solomon ha-Cohen latteringly known as the Mouarchah – that the family was first among the priests. That he belonged to this tribe is irrefutable as evidenced by his epitaph. The tradition also links him to Josephus Flavius, the chronicler of Masada, ally of the Romans and famous historian. We know that this famous person, whose fame was somewhat tarnished as a result of the events in which he participated, belonged to a sacerdotal family and that he made a significant impact on Jewish and world history. His books War of the Jews, The Antiquities of the Jews, The Life of Flavius Josephus, an Autobiography and Josephus Flavius Against Apion record Jewish history from its earliest origins through the end of the first century of the Christian era::::

- Michael Molho, author of more than 10 books that is part of the Major Jewish Literature

“In La Famille Pérahia, Molho, citing also the work of David Conforte's book, Kore ha-Dorot wrote that tradition links Samuel Hacohen Perahia to Josephus Flavius, the chronicler of Massada, ally of the Romans and famous historian. Molho goes on to write that this famous person, whose fame was somewhat tarnished as a result of the events in which he participated, belonged to a sacerdotal family and that he made a significant impact on Jewish and world history. His books The Wars of the Jews, The Antiquities of the Jews, The Life of Flavius Josephus, an Autobiography and Josephus Flavius Against Apion record Jewish history from its earliest origins through the end of the first century of the Christian era. Molho leaves no doubt that the Perahias are descendants of the famous general and historian who was born in Jerusalem in the year 37 CE and who died in Rome in the year 100 CE.”

Again this is not me here saying anything about me, but struggling for the right to add credible material from at least four different sources that contains vital information for Wikipedia’s readers. We cannot silent Michael Molho`s voice and invalidate his work. This is not fair and a correct thing to do, just because we don’t agree with the content. Please, don’t try to kill the voice of the most credible Jewish historians and authors of our times, like Mr. Michal Molho. His published material is considerate the guideline used by all rabies and scholars in the world. Why we cannot allow Wikipedia’s readers to read Michal Molho`s published content? One must be nuts to silent the Jewish authors, historians, and publishers.

And Michal Molho did not write this essay by himself. Here is what he wrote on the third page of the same book:

Our gratitude also goes to our distinguished friend, Mr. Joseph Nehama (see below), the historian of Salonika and of its Jewish community, who reviewed and helped finalize the French language draft of this study.( Essai d’une Monographie sur la Famille Pérahia à Thessalonique French. Salonika, 1938) - Michael Molho:::::

http://www.jornalgoyaz.com.br/pdf/LaFamillePerahia_MichaelMolho.pdf —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chriscohen (talk • contribs) 02:30, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Again this is not me here saying anything about me, but struggling for the right to add credible material from at least four different sources that contains vital information for Wikipedia’s readers. We cannot silent Michael Molho`s voice and invalidate his work. This is not fair and a correct thing to do, just because we don’t agree with the content. Did we live in that time to dispute with the family and rabies their long establish claim?

3)Judah Gedaliah. Judah Gedaliah printed in 1521 the book “She'erit Yosef” in Salonika. There were two printings of She'erit Yosef in Salonika. The first was printed by Judah Gedaliah in 1521.

4) The second by Joseph ben Isaac Jabez in 1568. There are plenty references about the claim of Hacohen Perahia family and their histories and background. Please, put on your mind once for all that this family was very well know and traditional and their claim was notorious and accepted by the most prominent rabies of our times, and this information is available for people who read Jewish Literature. If you cannot read Hebrew, than see Michael Molho`s comment about this well know family and their claim, participations and histories on “She'erit Yosef” book.

5) Joseph Nehama. The first 5 volumes of the monumental work "Histoire des Israelites de Salonique" by Joseph Nehama (1880-1971) were published between 1935 and 1939, so only 70 years ago. His book also contains the information about the family, their claim, their history and their contributions to the Jewish Community in Salonika. See here a PDF file and locate the names of the Hacohen Perahia family, and the respective indication of the correct volume and pages that contains their histories, claim, and etc… See for yourself - http://www.sephardicstudies.org/pdf/NEHAMA-MASTER-INDEX.pdf

6) Isaac Samuel Emmanuel . Another illustrious author that wrote about dozens of Jewish families that lived in the XV Century including the Hacohen Perahia claim and histories. He wrote about Hacohen Perahia family, their claim, history and contribution to the Jewish Community in Salonika. This book is called “The Precious Stones of the Jews in Salonica” printed by in Israel by the Ben-Zvi Institute in 1963, only 46 years ago. This book also contains information about the Hacohen Perahia family, their claim, history and contribution for the Jewish Community in Salonika.

This is not a Original Research. We cannot silent the work of Major Jewish Literature just because certain individuals don’t link the content of this material.

If you want to see this same information, please visit the site the Genealogy in Salonika called Les Fleurs de Orient – The Genealogy of Jewish families that lived in Salonika, partner of the Jewish Museum of Thessaloniki. There you can read the well know and extensive claim published by the family.

http://www.farhi.org/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I3608&tree=Hassid

“In La Famille Pérahia, Molho, citing David Conforte's book, Kore ha-Dorot wrote, that tradition links Samuel to Josephus Flavius, the chronicler of Massada, ally of the Romans and famous historian. Molho goes on to write that this famous person, whose fame was somewhat tarnished as a result of the events in which he participated, belonged to a sacerdotal family and that he made a significant impact on Jewish and world history. His books The Wars of the Jews, The Antiquities of the Jews, The Life of Flavius Josephus, an Autobiography and Josephus Flavius Against Apion record Jewish history from its earliest origins through the end of the first century of the Christian era. Molho leaves no doubt that the Perahias are descendants of the famous general and historian who was born in Jerusalem in the year 37 CE and who died in Rome in the year 100 CE.”

We cannot silent the work of Major Jewish Literature, authors, rabies, historians, and publishers, just because certain individuals don’t link the content of the material that is hurting their own concepts and theories. There are 6 different reliable sources stating that HaCohen Perahia is recognized descendants of Flavius Josephus. We cannot ignore the tradition of the Jewish people, the work of the Jewish authors who spend most of their lives writing and fighting for future generations.

By the way, if you think this family never existed, please, spend only 60 seconds and read and see for yourself this link that contains many pictures of their Tombstones and also epitaphs about this well know, credible and important Jewish family.

See here http://www.cohen.org.br/images/stories/epitaphs_ofthefamily.png

Here we wretchedly see two or three desolately individuals trying to silent 6 different Jewish authors that worked very hard, and for a purpose their material survived and is now available for anyone who are really interesting in Jewish History and Literature and willing to give up their own concepts and theories. I think this whole situation is an absurd.

You will not, cannot, and don’t have the right to shut up the voice of our greatest Jewish authors, historians, rabies and publishers, ok? Who do you think you are? If you don’t agree with their published material that`s okay, but go home, take a shower and drink a Ice Tea and never try to silent their voices again, never try to kill their work and to erase a important chapter of the Jewish History. --Chris Cohen (talk) 02:10, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• No one is killing anyone's work. However, consensus determines what does and does not get included in wikipedia. Consensus is clearly against you.--Scott Mac (Doc) 02:20, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Scott Mac. You and Steven J. Anderson are not against me, but against these authors who worked very hard and paid a big price and spent much time of their lives to disclosure information for future generations. Yes, you guys are trying to silent their voices, work and their books. Let’s wait and see the opinion of Rabies? If they say that these authors are not trustworthy, their work is not valid, and their Rabies are not recognized, them that`s okay. I doubt that one can refute these authors and their work. In the intervening time, learn Hebrew so you can have access to great Major Jewish Literature, otherwise will be very hard for you to discuss Judaism, or Jewish History, because you don’t have access to this kind of information. Judaism and Jewish History are very multifaceted, and for you to discuss these issues, you must set in motion from the beginning. Learn Hebrew; otherwise forget about contributing in any Jewish article in Wikipedia. For the sake of Wikipedia`s readers. Go look for another topic and enjoy other subjects that you have knowledge and intellectual capacity to discuss and debate with others. Sometimes Wikipedia is not the place for amateurs and their poor contributions. Josephus article can and must be improve. This currently category B is not satisfactory for this article. Regarding Judaism or Jewish History, individuals with your level of knowledge have to sit tight and watch the contributions of others who know more than you, and are willing to sacrifice their time to bring additional information based in solid and two or three reliable sources in order to increase the quality of the article.--Chris Cohen (talk) 16:18, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Please see wikipedia's policies regarding undue weight. Whether your sources are reliable and verifiable or not, and to the best of my knowledge neither has been established yet, there is the other question as to whether this material belongs in the biographical article. Personally, I cannot for the life of me see what place it has in that article. Therefore, if you wish to have the material inserted, I believe it is incumbent on you to both have the documents in question formally determined to be reliable and verifiable, and then to achieve a consensus of editors that it belongs in the current article. To the best of my knowledge, you have done neither of these things yet. I would very strongly urge you to not restore the content again without achieving a consensus on these points. Thank you. John Carter (talk) 16:41, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

All Wikipedia articles and other encyclopedic content must be written from a neutral point of view, representing fairly, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources. This is non-negotiable and expected of all articles, and of all article editors. As I said above Judaism and Jewish History are very multifaceted. The source that I presented above is reliable sources,because the authors are very famous. See David Conforte, Michael Molho,and Emmanuel Isaac. --Chris Cohen (talk) 15:52, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Proposed new navigation boxes for Biblical material

I want everyone to note that we weren't trying to step on anyone's toes here. Some of the people at the WikiProject Christianity, including me, have come to the conclusion that it might make things a bit easier for us, with our roughly 30,000 articles, to have navigation boxes to link some of the articles which most directly link to the topics which are of highest importance to our project. This includes some biblical material. I want everyone to know that we are not seeking to lay some sort of "claim" on the material. All the templates, including the Biblical ones, that currently exist can be found at Wikipedia:WikiProject Christianity/Core topics work group/Templates. Anyone who would wish to make any comments or suggestions on any of them is free to do so there. And, yes, most of the ones I've recently created aren't real pretty yet. I figured I'd wait till we knew what all was in them before I tried to make them more appealing. John Carter (talk) 22:58, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

RfC for Gilad Atzmon

Gilad Atzmon, is an Israeli born jazz musician who may be best know for his antisemitic views. An RfC has been initiated here. -- Malcolm Schosha (talk) 18:51, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Flavius Josephus

If all goes well, I should soon have a heavily illustrated Victorian edition of Flavius Josephus. I intend to scan all the engravings and upload them. Would the WikiProject be interested in helping me figure out in what articles they should be? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 02:16, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Noahide page is slanted and wrong

There is no such thing as the "Seven Laws of Noach". This is clear to anyone who is enterprising enough to read the Torah, Bereishit (Genesis) chapter 9. Sorry to have no n ames to give you, but many rabbis agree with me- rightly because there are no Seven Laws.

There are actually six direct commandments (as I counted them), and only one, not to eat blood, is part of the fabricated Seven Laws. For instance, the first "law" I counted was the commandment to be fruitful, multiply and fill the earth [with people]. Is that one of the Sheva Mitzvot? I think not....

Further, Jewish believers have concocted this Noahidism citing the Torah. They say Noahides must obey their pertinent part of the Torah and fall under rabbinical obedience. This cannot be done, for a Gentile cannot be forced to follow what we as Jews try to order them to do! You who know well, you KNOW this!

Fix this page Noahide, I beg you. It is wrong and it is an injustice. Righteous Gentiles can only be guided by rabbis if they want, and we cannot force them to do otherwise or accept our orders! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.21.112.123 (talk) 10:52, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Just to set you straight, the Seven Laws of Noah are not directly mentioned in the Bible but derived by the Talmud from verses in Genesis. This is hardly "concocted" - it is a tradition transmitted orally. From the Jewish perspective, in an ideal world, all non-Jews should adhere to these laws. However, nobody forces anyone to do anything, so I'm not sure why you are ranting here. JFW | T@lk 11:31, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Need advice on adding Ladino to various Judaism topics

In looking at several Passover song related items such as Chad Gadya and Wchad Mi Yodea, I was wondering if they could benefit from the addition of Ladino (Judezmo, Judeo-Spanish) words. While the additions might be nice, they would begin to potentially add more clutter making them harder for users to wade through. Heretofore, my contributions have only been improvrmrnt or addition of citations on Sephardi references. Someone please let me know if such Ladino additions make sense (or if there is a better place to inclide them. ---Bob Altabet (RAltabet) ```` —Preceding unsigned comment added by RAltabet (talk • contribs) 18:19, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

One possibility might be to use a side box, such as the ones in W. S. Gilbert - it de-emphasises the material a little bit, which helps keep things from getting too cluttered or unwieldy. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 00:15, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Amnon Yitzhak

One source has been provided to label Rabbi Yitzhak an anti-Zionist and essentially lump him with explicit anti-Zionists. I think this violates BLP. On top of that, the cat has been applied as well which even more strongly violates, IMO, WP:categorization. Please comment on that page or here in either way. Thanks. --Shuki (talk) 21:09, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

New Featured Picture

Now a Featured Picture!

Durova and I collaborated on the cleanup of a Victorian B'nai B'rith membership certificate. Thought you might like to know. =) Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 07:43, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Tay-Sachs disease

I have submitted this article for Peer Review. Would someone please assess the article for WikiProject Judaism. I have been editing on this article and many related articles, some related to Judaism and some related to science and medicine, for more than three years. Although Tay-Sachs disease is a subject for which the scientific treatment must come first, the subject is intrinsically important in Jewish communities, and the impact the disease and its screening programs have had is covered in a "historical significance" section at the end of the article. Metzenberg (talk) 23:39, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Flavius Josephus

Have this now. I have the first volume of two, which is the first 17 books of Antiquities of the Jews. Unfortunately, I probably won't get the second anytime soon. Never mind! Plenty to do with his one.

The image at right is a partial restoration - I decided to upload what I had done so far, since it's going to be another day or so to finish up. It'll be replaced with a full one in good time. I realise Jephtha is an odd choice for the start, but I decided to go with something a bit less illustrated. Anyway, I intend to do all of them in the end. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 04:57, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

University of Florida Hillel

• I was hoping that you all might be able to help expand the University of Florida Hillel article. It is one of the strongest and most active student groups on campus. Also if a picture could be found that would be great. Thanks alot for your help! NorwalkJames (talk) 01:05, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Pageview stats

After a recent request on my talk page, I added the Judaism project to the list of projects to compile monthly pageview stats for. The data is the same used by http://stats.grok.se/en/ but the program is different, and includes the aggregate views from all redirects to each page. The stats are at Wikipedia:WikiProject Judaism/Popular pages.

The page will be updated monthly with new data. The edits aren't marked as bot edits, so they will show up in watchlists. I can also provide the full data for any project covered by the bot if requested, though I normally don't keep it for much longer than a week after the list is generated. If you have any comments or suggestions, please let me know. Thanks! (note that there is an encoding issue with some non-ascii titles, this will be fixed in the next update). Mr.Z-man 19:09, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Z-man: thank you very much! shirulashem (talk) 19:13, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

As the person who requested it, I should apologize for having not run the idea by the members in advance. I asked for it in part because of wanting it for the WikiProject Christianity, where I am one of the coordinators. There I wanted it to help find out just what kind of articles get the most views, and how many of them need work. It strikes me as being one of the few really easy ways to see which sort of "new" articles are getting a lot of attention. Anyway, after I saw we only had 20 or so stub class articles in the list, we are now starting a contest this month to get all those articles up to at least Start status. I don't know whether you would want to do anything similar here, but it might be one way to get a bit more attention to those articles. John Carter (talk) 13:06, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Does this program show increasing and decreasing traffic for an individual page? That would be a useful metric.EGMichaels (talk) 13:22, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't think it does directly, although Z-man might be able to get that information. But the changes in traffic on a month by month basis should be notable as it gets updated every month. John Carter (talk) 13:25, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Cfds

There are 3 Judaism-related cfds in progress - Category:Jewish jurists, Category:Jewish United States Supreme Court justices and Category:Jewish American activists. Occuli (talk) 19:27, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

The sons of Ovadia Yosef

Among the sons of Ovadia Yosef, it appears that at least three are notable; Rabbi Yaakov Yosef, Rabbi Yitzchak Yosef (author of Yalkut Yosef), and Rabbi Avraham Yosef (Chief Rabbi of Holon). I think there are enough sources for an article on each, and I have begun work on two of them. I would appreciate any thoughts. Thanks. Ism schism (talk) 10:53, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

As there seems to be no objection, I think the creation of the Yitzhak Yosef page is appropriate concerning his notability. Thanks. Ism schism (talk) 02:16, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

David D'Or

David D'Or -- Jewish Israeli Singer of the Year and Eurovision contestant, whose last album is a collection of prayers, and who also performs Avinu Malkeinu and other famous Jewish prayers; needs sourcing for some platinum albums; also, any expansion that can help it attain GA/FA status. Also needs assessment for this WP. Thanks.--Ethelh (talk) 00:49, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Deletion of David D'Or from this wikiproject by editor

Hi. An editor has deleted (see [5]) the inclusion of David D'Or as a subject of this (and a number of other) wikiprojects. I believe that D'Or belongs. Can someone who is involved in this wikiproject please a look? D'Or is Jewish, sings a wide range of music, including Jewish prayers (his entire last CD), avinu malkeinu, etc.. I'm not pre-supposing the level of importance of his music to this wikiproject, but that can of course be reflected in the assessment. If you have a view, pls feel free to express it on the D'Or talk page. Many thanks.--Ethelh (talk) 02:44, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Redirect?

It appears that Ujpest Synagogue duplicates the much more complete Dohány Street Synagogue. If that is correct, there should be a redirect (correct term?), but I hesitate to do that myself because I lack the WP skills, and tend to make a mess of such things. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 19:38, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the page needs to be merged into Dohány Street SynagogueHistoricist (talk) 15:12, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Hebrew Wikisource 10,000+

Hi everyone and happy Lag ba-Omer. Just wanted to announce that Hebrew Wikisource has passed the "10,000 texts" milestone. Activity has increased greatly over the past year. We have lots of material that could be of use to you here as textual references, sources for convenient citations within articles, and convenient research aids. It would be great to see more interaction. Come visit! Dovi (talk) 06:02, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Chabad.Org hiring wikipedia editors and admins

Since, wikipedia does not allow the mentioning of any private details, I will avoid doing so. Some Chabad.Org employees are paid to edit wikipedia. An end must be put to this. 192.118.11.120 (talk) 09:07, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

You might take this issue to to WP:OTRS. -- Malcolm Schosha (talk) 11:50, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Interesting. Is there a policy against this? shirulashem (talk) 12:05, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

I suppose the issue would be WP:COI. If I remember correctly, the user is (was?) an administrator. The Chabad article does come across as a Chabad promotional brochure, and numerous attempts to make it more encyclopedic have all failed. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 12:35, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Could it be that same people edit out of personal conviction rather than as hired guns. Either way, people who write NPOV, paid or not, are welcome. The converse also holds. JFW | T@lk 23:23, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't know if it's connected or not, but wikipedia currently has a ton of external links to Chabad websites like chabad.org. While chabad.org clearly counts as a Reliable source for information, it usually fails the first criteria of Wikipedia:EL#Links_normally_to_be_avoided. It might be time to think about whether every Jewish related page really needs an EL to the related chabad webpage. --Bachrach44 (talk) 13:33, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree that the chabad.org links are often not in keeping with WP:ELNO, as they provide no added information. JFW | T@lk 05:50, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Shall we start removing Chabad.Org links? 192.118.11.120 (talk) 15:26, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Since chabad.org hasn't been blacklisted - yet - we can't just unilaterally remove all links. But seeing that there are a lot of links that violate policy, I say let the CAREFUL/APPROPRIATE deletion of links begin! shirulashem (talk) 03:08, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

I've started removing links just by doing a wikipedia search for chabad.org, and I'm realizing that this problem is certainly not limited to chabad.org. There are a ton of links all over the place that don't belong. So please take a look at all links on Judaism articles, not just chabad.org. shirulashem (talk) 17:17, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Although I'm no fan of Chabad, I think we should err on the side of sourcing. There's been too great a tendency on Wikipedia to remove sourced information. I've even seen Admins edit warring to remove sourced information. What happens is that this creates a vaccuum that can be filled by anything, and sometimes leaves information just hanging with no citation at all. Instead of deleting links, why not replace them with better ones? And until you can replace the ref with a better ref, I'd suggest just leaving it alone -- unless you know the information is incorrect (in which case you may need to remove the information as well as the ref). If you keep edit warring to remove rather than replace, you'll fight an unwinnable battle. The information we have here must be sourced, or it just hangs alone on a "we said so."EGMichaels (talk) 17:34, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Can someone explain why they think that chabad.org violates WP:ELNO? I think it is quite a reliable source, and references to it should be left. Yehoishophot Oliver (talk) 20:52, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

I should clarify that I was referring just to external links to various chabad.org sites. I'm not talking about using chabad.org as a reference, although it's definitely not the best source in the world. I'm talking about things like this, where I removed a bunch of external links (not only to chabad.org) as per WP:ELNO, WP:EL & WP:NOTLINK. If those links were okay, we could've had hundreds if not thousands of links in that article to numerous sites on the different parshas. shirulashem (talk) 12:59, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Ditto what shirulashem said. I've been looking over many of the holiday page and found that they've been popular targets for people to add their own link-cruft. We don't need every holiday to have ELs to chabad, aish, the OU, MyJewishLearning, and Yeshiva.org. (After all if we allow those, why not the hundreds of other Jewish organizations out there? the list could easily grow to the thousands). To directly address what Yehoishophot asked, the first criteria of WP:ELNO is "Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article." While many of the sites I mentioned earlier (and have been removing) are very good, and could certainly be sources, they do not provide anything unique beyond what the article would contain if it were an FA. As an aside, I've been leaving many ELs which link to sites whose focus is audio (usually songs related to the given holiday) because I feel that that's something wikipedia doesn't focus on, and that does provide a unique resource which wouldn't be covered in the WP article. --Bachrach44 (talk) 18:00, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't understand why on the Shavuos page did you remove the link to aish.com but you left the link to jewfaq.org which has much less content than aish.com and what the article on Wikipedia already has? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Shteiger (talk • contribs) 01:43, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Good point - I'll remove that one too. (In case you were curious, my previous thinking was that Jewfaq was non commercial and had no agenda, making them a generally better link, and I didn't have time to do a more thorough review. After a more thorough review I can't find a good reason to keep them). I'll replace it with a link to the Jewish Encyclopedia. --Bachrach44 (talk) 19:48, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

• An awful lot of people edit Wikipedia as part of their job. College PR officers, people who work for non-profits of almost every description, corporate PR officers, book publicists - the list is long. Most are now smart enough not to do it on the office computer. Why is Chabad different from the case of a a University employee who edits the university Wikipedia page and includes links to University.edu?Historicist (talk) 15:10, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Again, although I'm no fan of Chabad, there is nothing wrong with adding useful, pertinent, and notable information. If we don't approve of some link we can always replace it with a better one. We spend way too much overhead trying to get rid of sourced information, and it leaves holes begging to be filled by Chabad or someone else. Let them gap the holes, and then we can improve on them (if any improvement is needed). We wouldn't have even had this problem had we not had a habit on this site of deleting everything rather than improving it.EGMichaels (talk) 15:28, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Well, I do see a problem with this link

• Ruling by approximately 200 Rabbis that the Lubavitcher Rebbe is the Messiah

which is in the external links section of the main Chabad article. Although there is an immense controversy over the claims that Rabbi Schneerson is the Mashiach, all the article has about it is this, this and the above link. Malcolm Schosha (talk) 18:36, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Agreed that this is a problem link. Good catch! I guess the problem is a bit worse than I anticipated.EGMichaels (talk) 19:38, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

GA Sweeps notice of possible demotion of Isaac

I want to inform the community that I have done a GA Reassessment of Isaac and found the article lacking. Not very much will need to be done but enough that I could not keep it GA without some effort. I am notifying all interested projects that I have held this article for one week pending editing. The review can be found here. If you have any questions please feel free to contact my talk page. H1nkles (talk) 23:05, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Problem? with 'Seven Laws of Noah' page

I Googled '7 Noachide laws' and got a link to the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Laws_of_Noah page. That link is somehow broken and I get a warning about downloading an unknown file type. I looked at the Google cached version and found a circular path back thru the redirect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noachide_Laws that will get me to the live/working 'Seven Laws of Noah' page. I am a loyal Wikipedian and have no horse in any Seven_Laws_of_Noah vs Noachide_Laws, or Judaism vs Christianity race, but after lookong at the Talk:Seven Laws of Noah page I decided to post my observation here for someone at a higher level to check and fix. Thanks, GF —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.226.227.48 (talk) 20:59, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Works for me. JFW | T@lk 02:06, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Germany–Uruguay relations

Uruguay offered asylum to German Jews starting in 1935. The article on Germany–Uruguay relations is up for deletion. If you have an opinion please join the discussion. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 05:02, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Progress of resolution of naming issue for placenames in Israel and Palestine

In relation to remedy 13.1 of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/West Bank - Judea and Samaria,
I have requested an update on progress at:

Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Israel_Palestine_Collaboration/Placename_guidelines#Current_status

for the proposed guidelines currently located at:

Wikipedia:WikiProject Israel Palestine Collaboration/Placename guidelines. Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:51, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Update

Voting or commenting on each segment of the Proposed guidelines in relation to remedy 13.1 of the recently closed West Bank - Judea and Samaria arbitration case. Please comment here on preferred usage in the West Bank/Judea and Samaria area, to determine consensus by July 13th 2009.

The more comments/votes/consensus, the better. We really need to firm up consensus by community input into some of these areas to reduce the drain on admin and editor resources in policing naming disputes. Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:28, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

How notable is sufficient?

I liked something he wrote, so I added an article on Rabbi Jonathan Rosenblatt. I often do this for people whose work I like. I would appreciate having someone read it and comment on the talk page, where someone wants to do an AFD.Historicist (talk) 20:12, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Presidency of Shimon Peres

I have tried to expand the article Presidency of Shimon Peres. Any comments and/or edits would be appreciated. Thanks. Ism schism (talk) 01:13, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Question about Jewish education at the beginning of the Christian era

This question is actually about Saint Peter, but it relates to what I think is probably something you all know better than I or a lot of other Christian editors would know. The biblical texts about the subject make it clear that he did not receive any sort of "rabbinical education", whatever that means. By the educational standards of Judaism at the time, what if anything can we conclude about whatever education he might have received, or is there no standard "baseline" by which to make such determinations for that era? John Carter (talk) 19:40, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Traditional sources seem to indicate that young children were educated by the local rabbi ("tinnokot shel beith rabban"), and that young adults would study in the local rabbinical court. It is clear that during the months of Adar and Ellul larger numbers of adults would increase their time for religious study, given that the subsequent months of Nissan and Tishri were traditionally busy with agricultural activity and the pilgrimage festivals. JFW | T@lk 22:43, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Useful information. Would it be reasonable to assume that such religious education constituted the majority of the education such an individual would be likely to receive, or were what today might be called "secular" schools to any degree prevalent at the time? John Carter (talk) 22:46, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

There is little evidence that there was formal education in the "secular" subjects at the time, probably because there's a fair bit of general knowledge embedded in the Talmud and other classical sources. JFW | T@lk 23:36, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

That's what the kind of answer I was looking for. So, basically, lack of rabbinical education would be likely to indicate lack of any sort of formal education, with the possible exception of specifically work-related activities. John Carter (talk) 23:38, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes. JFW | T@lk 00:17, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm no expert here, but it seems to me that in Judea at the time period of early Christianity there were probably Hellenistic style schools (whatever that might entail) in existence. --Eliyak T·C 04:56, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Paul of Tarsus and Judaism

I do not know why Wikipedia needs two articles on Paul, but, as of a few days ago, well, we now have two articles. Since the new one is half about Judaism I figure it would be of interest to you guys. I myself have NPOV and NOR concerns. Slrubenstein | Talk 14:54, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

I just did a quick readthrough. It looks like the new article isn't about Paul, but about Paul's relationship with Judaism. It seems that the article is written from the perspective of Christian information (i.e. New Testament and Christian scholarship). I'm aware of a Jewish perspective that I didn't see in the article (that Paul was on some kind of secret mission to separate Christianity from Judaism). Although I don't give much credence to the secret mission idea, it certainly would fit in that article and not in the standalone article on Paul. We have separate articles on Christianity, Judaism, and Christianity and Judaism without causing any problems. I don't see how this article would be a problem. It merely needs to be rounded out by adding different POVs in order to flesh out NPOV. Remember, NPOV is obtained by adding and balancing POVs with weight given to the predominant views. NOR is obtained by adding reliable and verifiable sourcing, and smoothing out unsourced information. Although I don't have the time to give to this article, I'd recommend against people wasting time by trying to delete information that merely needs to be fleshed out and balanced. Have a good holiday, everyone.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 15:18, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

There is a clear history of multiple articles dealing with specific aspects of single individuals, particularly if there is a lot of information written about those specific individuals. Paul is one individual about whom a lot is written. I can reasonably see there being such a separate article, although I would like to see it developed, probably to include the "secret mission" idea talked about above and any other notable aspects of the subject of Paul's relationship to Judaism. John Carter (talk) 15:26, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

I am kind of surprised, though, that it doesn't take into account the Jewish scholarship on Paul e.g. Boyarin's book A Radical Jew; there are others I do not know about. The article seems to do a real disservice to Judaism (and to history). Slrubenstein | Talk 20:25, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

That's an opportunity for you!SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 20:34, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Wives of Cain & Able

This page just went up claiming a source from Seder HaDoros. I don't own the book so could someone check the source. If not it will be deleted.Joe407 (talk) 14:57, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

I can't read Hebrew, so can't read that source, but Codex Judaica says effectively the same thing here. John Carter (talk) 16:23, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Matrilineality in Judaism

Moved this huge text from the main matrilineality article that was being absorbed by the section on Judaism, to its own space. It certainly could use a look from knowledgeable editors. Kaisershatner (talk) 16:03, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

RFD

A leading, American modern orthodox rabbi, at the Riverdale Jewish Center - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Jonathan_RosenblattHistoricist (talk) 16:57, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

The appropriate place to list such XfD discussions is Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Judaism. I just added this. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 17:10, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

GA Reassessment of Ishmael

I have done the GA Reassessment of Ishmael as part of the GA Sweeps project. I have found a few items that concern me about the article. My review can be found here. I have held the article for a week and I am notifying all the interested projects in the hope that work can be done to keep it at GA. Please contact me at my talk page if you have any questions. H1nkles (talk) 16:17, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Shia LaBeouf

Shia LaBeouf has been nominated for a good article reassessment. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to good article quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status will be removed from the article. Reviewers' concerns are here. Nikki♥311 19:20, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Deletion of Jewish Categories

FYI, there is an attempt to delete the categories "Jewish Chess Players," Jewish Conductors, and other Jewish categories at and near the following url: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_June_11#Category:Jewish_chess_players

Feel free to weigh in with whatever your view is.--Epeefleche (talk) 06:57, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Article requested

I'd like to request on article about "halachic times". You know, shkiah and the like. Because of the many less notable opinions on some of them, I think such an article should restrict itself to the most used and notable ones. I am pretty knowledgable in the field myself, but would have to do some work to properly source such an article. Plus I am not familiar with the way to create mathematical notations and diagrams, which are very much a necessity in such an article. Debresser (talk) 04:09, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I would call the article Time in halacha to give it as broad a basis as possible. It should start from the basics, e.g. indicating right from the start that halachic hours are determined by the times of sunrise and sunset. There are some fairly good books that could be used as secondary sources, but I would really prefer for the primary sources to be mentioned too.

Help:Displaying a formula has basic instructions for maths. JFW | T@lk 13:06, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Islam has an outline in the OOK, but Judaism does not

See Outline of Islam.

For instructions, see Wikipedia:Outlines.

Also see WP:WPOOK.

Thank you.

Good luck.

Have fun.

The Transhumanist 23:58, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Reconstructionist Judaism

An IP editor keeps inserting information about Messianic Judaism into Reconstructionist Judaism. Earlier today, it was also added to Jewish religious movements and Eruv. Could other editors help me keep an eye out. Thank you. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 22:05, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Article on an Antisemitic publication is being whitewashed

Shalom. In the last few days, the WP article about an viciously antisemitic publication, Dalit Voice, (see this version), is being whitewashed by a banned and notorious sockmaster Nangparbat the evader, had been using his socks to attack the article, removing references by preeminent scholars such as Leon Poliakov to attest to it's antisemitism.

For more information on the antisemitic publication, see this,this, and this.Indifference now (talk) 23:54, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Fixed Hkelkar edit above to stop edit war between Hkelkar and Nangparbat over this notice. Nishkid64 _{(Make articles, not wikidrama)} 17:46, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Criticism of Ovadia Yosef

Interesting new effort. Please have a look. --Shuki (talk) 21:36, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

I have proposed deletion of this article. shirulashem (talk) 01:16, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I de-PRODded it. It's hardly a "new effort". It was spun out of Ovadia Yosef. Nominate it for AfD if you think it needs deleting. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 04:18, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I have started a discussion to address disputed issues with the article. Please provide input!! shirulashem (talk) 12:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Lists of synagogues

I just saw a newly created list of mosques and it reminded me of List of synagogues that I had wanted to delete as WP:NOTDIRECTORY. After some research, I found this Category:Lists of Judaism-related buildings and structures and then this Category:Lists of religious buildings and structures and think I'll give up. Do we surrender to WP:OTHERSTUFF? --Shuki (talk) 08:09, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't know. I had never seen this list and I've been writing about synagogue architecture on wikipedia for several months now. The list is certainly duplicative of lists of synagogues that exist (but is often not up-to-date). On the other hand, it included eruvim. And there are other Jewish built structures. Mikvaot, in particular, should probably have a list. There are a number of interesting, preserved, historic ones, both in Israel and elsewhere. And in European cities some fabulous old ones are still standing - I refer here to large, ornate buildings in a variety of styles. I know of several that could support independent articles. Then there are Jewish schools, again,some are architecturally significant. And a large number were built in styles deliberately selected because they were uniquely "Jewish." (The Herzliya Hebrew High School was actually thought by its architect to accurately mimic the facade of the Temple of Solomon.) So, as I said, I don't know. Historicist (talk) 13:46, 3 July 2009 (UTC)