Talk:Books of the Bible/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: ItsZippy (talk · contribs) 12:11, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Hi there, I shall review this article for you. I'll leave my comments, feedback and final assessment shortly. ItsZippy ^{(talk • contributions)} 12:11, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Rate	Attribute	Review Comment
1. Well-written:
	1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct.	The prose is generally alright. It would need improvement it you were to take it to FA, but there's no problem as far as the GA criteria are concerned.
	1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.	The lead is the main problem here. The lead should summarise the whole article - it should contain a brief account of everything that will be mentioned in the article. There should be no major topic in the article which is not mentioned in the lead. A good guideline for lead sections is to write a summary paragraph for every top level section of the article.
2. Verifiable with no original research:
	2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline.	The sources all seem to be ok, and any controviersial statements are referenced.
	2b. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose).	Yep.
	2c. it contains no original research.	No problem here.
3. Broad in its coverage:
	3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic.	I am not convinced that this is broad enough. The content on the books of the Bible is good, but there's nothing beyond that. What disputes have there been over the books of the Bible? Why have different denominates accepted different canons? How have other religions/groups viewed the books of the Bible (perhaps Islamic views, or atheist views)? Look for the impact that the subject has had on different cultures, societies and religions.
	3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).	Not a problem.
	4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.	Neutrality is good.
	5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.	No evidence of edit warring.
6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
	6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content.	This is fine.
	6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.	There is one image, but the images used could be improved. The current image (of the development of the Old Testament) is slightly confusing and could do with clarification. Also, I am sure that Wikipedia has relevant images - old manuscripts, or images of certain books. There is this image of Proverbs, for example.
	7. Overall assessment.	This article does not pass our Good Article criteria at this time. The main issues are with the lead and the breadth of coverage; once you address those, the article should success a GA nomination.

• I'm not formally reviewing this, but I wonder whether it might be better to work the article towards featured list status instead. Just a thought. --He to Hecuba (talk) 14:12, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

  That's a possibility, but it would drastically change the nature of the article. I think that, because of the controversy around which books form the Biblical canon, it would be difficult to have a list which includes all the books, remains neutral, and manages to discuss all of the issues involved - once you achieve that, you're on the way to a good/featured article again. Also, there is probably a lot of history, reception, etc which needs to be covered here that could not be in a featured list. ItsZippy ^{(talk • contributions)} 17:07, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

  Hmm, I just wonder what would differentiate this article from Biblical canon if further developed. They treat roughly the same subject in fairly similar ways. --He to Hecuba (talk) 17:09, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

  Yes, that's true - I'd forgotten about that article. In which case, a list format might be better. We'd probably need to establish the consensus first, but I can see the merits of the idea. ItsZippy ^{(talk • contributions)} 18:27, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

• Certainly the Biblical canon article should be the one to discuss issues over which books have been included (or excluded) and why. However, there is still a lot that ought to be covered here. There are traditional groupings of books that are not explained, such as which books are "prophecy" and what this means (and how this differs between the Hebrew Tanakh and Christian Old Testament), which are "history", and so on. There also ought to be a summary about the time, place, and language in which most of the books were composed and then written down. There is a lot that could be included here without duplicating content of the article on canonicity. Most of all, there need to be many more scholarly references, which should be plentiful. --EncycloPetey (talk) 20:04, 19 February 2012 (UTC)