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The Judaism Newsletter

This newsletter was automatically delivered because you are a member of one or more Judaism related WikiProjects. If you would like to opt out of future mailings, please remove your name from this list. As always, please direct all questions, comments, requests, barnstars, offers of help, and angry all-caps anti-semitic rants to my talk page. Thanks, and have a great month. L'Aquatique[approves|this|message] 20:31, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

• Newsletter delivery by xenobot 21:18, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Judaizing Jerusalem

Do you/will you have time to add all of that, and police the article going forward? Historicist (talk) 14:47, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Historicist. I cannot promise to "police" any one article. With Passover fast approaching, many things will have to wait a while. But I can try to keep an eye out and add what I can especially if you will call on me to do so. I think that the real issue is one of perception, that while almost all Israelis and Jews view the resettlement and rebuilding of Jerusalem by huge Jewish communities as one of the great marvels of modern Jewish history, obviously this may not make some anti-Israel people happy because nothing the Jews do, short of national suicide, will ever satisfy them. So anyhow, while some may think that "Judaization of Jerusalem" is some sort of insult or pejorative, and its just too crazy to see how Israel's enemies think they have hit on yet another colorful term to insult the Jews and Judaism and stoke up world opinion accordingly, in the eyes of most of the Jewish people today it's actually a great compliment and nothing to be either ashamed or afraid of. IZAK (talk) 02:07, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Mazel Tov, Congratulations!

On your recognised interview about the Jewish wiki-project. Yes we r silent, but we do love u for all your hard work. Tnx--Chaim Shel (talk) 13:50, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

• Thank you very much! IZAK (talk) 08:52, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Help, please

Hi. Last week, I made a request on the WikiProject Judaism talk page for some help in finding a transliteration of part of the U'n'taneh Tokef, specifically the section beginning and ending "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." Would you be able to help, please? 212.84.120.40 (talk) 07:39, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

• Hi, thanks for contacting me. There are transliterated machzorim available, see ArtScroll's Machzor: Transliterated: Full Size Rosh Hashanah - Ashkenaz - Seif Edition and ArtScroll's Machzor: Transliterated: Full Size Yom Kippur - Ashkenaz - Seif Edition. Hope this helps, IZAK (talk) 13:40, 5 April 2009 (UTC)
  • Hi again. As I was only looking for this one section, I was hoping to find something free somewhere on the Web. Thanks, though, for your suggestion. 212.84.103.193 (talk) 17:13, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXXVII (March 2009)

The March 2009 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.
This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 02:47, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Khazaria.com

In light of the multitude of new references I have added to the article, I ask that you reconsider your vote in this afd. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 14:52, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Brian: To clarify, I did not vote to "delete" it but rather to "Merge and redirect to Khazars, the main article" [1] hence saving it by merging it with the main article. Big difference. I know and greatly respect your concern and expertise in this area. Be well, IZAK (talk) 20:11, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Hebrew help

Hi there. I chose you at random among users who know Hebrew; I hope you won't mind me asking for your help. I'm trying to decide whether this is vandalism or a good faith (but really unnecessary) edit. Could you possibly tell me if it's at least correct? I'd really appreciate anything you can tell me. Thanks. :) -- edi(talk) 17:11, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Edi: Thank you for contacting me. Sorry for my absence, but it was the long Passover holiday. If you need help like this, there is usually someone around at WP:TALKJUDAISM where you can post any kind of question or ask for help with essentially any Judaica and Hebraica questions and not be delayed. IZAK (talk) 22:48, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
• Now that I have looked at your question I can tell you that it is the correct way to transliterate Barbra Streisand from English to Hebrew, but honestly, why is that addition needed? she is not an Israeli singer and since when does every last Jewish celebrity not directly connenected to Israel need to get their Hebrew name inserted as if it was their cyber-"bris" or "barmitzva" "ceremony" on Wikipedia? Take care! IZAK (talk) 22:52, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the information. I totally agree that it needs to go; I just wasn't sure how to label it when I remove it. And no worries on the delay; I wasn't in any hurry. Thanks for the WP:TALKJUDAISM link though; that should be very useful. I've gotta go edit the article of a certain female singer now... :) -- edi(talk) 05:09, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

The sons of Ovadia Yosef

Hello IZAK. I have started to construct an article on former Knesset member Rabbi Yaakov Yosef. My question is - 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) - do you agree? I think there is enough sources for an article on each. I would appreciate any thoughts you have. Thanks. Ism schism (talk) 23:59, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

• Hi: Thank you for contacting me. This subject needs closer scrutiny. All the sons/daughters of a notable person are not automatically notable, especially if they attained their fame only because of their father's powerful role in a given society or nation, like crown princes in a feudal system. Do they all qualify according to Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons and Wikipedia:Notability (people) fair and square? Or are they notable mainly because of their father and it would therefore be only nepotism in high gear? Could a case be made that the sons should all be included in the main article about the father? As I said, it needs to be looked in greater depth. Please get more input from other knowledgeable Judaic editors at WP:TALKJUDAISM. IZAK (talk) 08:06, 6 May 2009 (UTC)
  • Thank you very much for your response and comments. I just posted on WP:TALKJUDAISM as well. Thanks again. Ism schism (talk) 10:55, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXXVIII (April 2009)

The April 2009 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.
This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 23:18, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Speedy deletion of File:Rebbe Nachman s grave.jpg

A tag has been placed on File:Rebbe Nachman s grave.jpg requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section I2 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is an image page for a missing or corrupt image or an empty image description page for a Commons-hosted image.

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, you may contest the deletion by adding {{hangon}} to the top of the page that has been nominated for deletion (just below the existing speedy deletion or "db" tag), coupled with adding a note on the talk page explaining your position, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the page meets the criterion it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the page that would render it more in conformance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. Jay32183 (talk) 22:20, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

• I did not create this page I only placed a category below it after someone else had created it. I don't know where it went to as there is no photo there now. IZAK (talk) 08:41, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 May 6

I remember you from some years ago, and thought you might have something to add to these discussions:

• Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 May 6#Jewish jurists.
• Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 May 6#Religions of United States Supreme Court justices.
• Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 May 6#Category:Jewish American activists.

--William Allen Simpson (talk) 00:49, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

• Hi, and thanks for contacting me. I agree with you and I am on record as being opposed to these kinds of frivolous categories for many years now, see User:IZAK/Deleting lists and categories of Jews. Please continue to ensure that all new nominations that deal with Jews or Judaism in any way are promptly posted at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Judaism. Thanks again and please stay in touch. IZAK (talk) 09:30, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 May 13

I see that you found the May 11th, too. I've added another batch on May 13th, and reconfigured the Deletion sorting format to make longer lists easier to read.

What should be done about Category:Jews by occupation? Seem to be much like those in your frivolous category list. Some are virtually identical!

None of the other subcategories of Category:People by religion and occupation have such a long list, usually just writers and theologians and clergy.

--William Allen Simpson (talk) 05:53, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

• Hi again: Thanks for following up. Category:Jews by occupation is totally stupid and frivolous, like a national population survey that noone applied for and noone asked for. Jews and Judaism are connected and to place anyone in these categories implies that they were fully aware of this connection, subscribed to it and presumably fully (self) identified as such, which they did not. It would be safe to say that 99.99% of the "Jews" in Category:Jews by occupation did not have much to do with Jews or with Judaism during their lifetimes. Many of them are in fact not considered Jewish by classical Jewish law and they had little or no formal or even informal contact with the Jewish people or with Judaism, yet now they become enthroned as examples of full-fledged "Jews" on Wikipedia -- what kind of logic is that? A category is valid to be labelled as Jewish if people in it are either CLEARLY profesionally and directly spiritually tied in with Judaism, Jews and the Jewish people, such as Category:Rabbis who are both directly part of the Jewish religion (Judaism) and/or are clearly Jews by (self) identity and profession that's accurate, AND NOT BECAUSE PEOPLE IGNORANT OF JEWS AND JUDAISM THINK IT'S CUTE TO HAVE SUCH CATEGORIES, but for far too long there has been ongoing abuse on Wikipedia (mainly through crass ignorance) of the notion that Jews are an ethnicity (which is true in an abstract manner relating mainly to strict Jewish law) but it has been flogged to death in the wrong way and stretched far beyond any reasonable and logical standards so that if someone allegedly had a Jewish ancestor a hundred years ago or was called "Jewish" by a celebrity magazine they become "notable" Jews no less than the chief rabbis of Israel or the rabbis of the Talmud. Therefore you are to be commended for taking on this job of eradicating these misleading, frivolous and downright stupid categories when noone asked Wikipedia to become an "encyclopedic enforcer" or religion and ethnicity calling people "Jewish" when they are far from it and never admited to it most of the time, worthy of the Nuremberg Laws tagging every last human who is alleged to have even the merest of connections to Jews and the Jewish people that in almost 99.99% of the cases never admited to and never self-identified as such. You can count on my full support in ridding Wikipedia of these frivolous categories at long last. Keep me posted and keep posting any new nominations at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Judaism so that each nomination can receive a fair hearing. IZAK (talk) 06:27, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

CfD nomination of Category:Jewish film and theatre

I have nominated Category:Jewish film and theatre (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at the discussion page. Thank you. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 19:39, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Shawn. Thank you for bringing my attention to this matter. I have added mu views. Sincerely, IZAK (talk) 06:40, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

CfD nomination of Category:Images of Wikipedia barnstars

I have nominated Category:Images of Wikipedia barnstars (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at the discussion page. Thank you. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 21:45, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Drilnoth: The CfD is now moot since the images were subsequently moved to WP:Commons. Sincerely, IZAK (talk) 06:46, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : XXXIX (May 2009)

The May 2009 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.
This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 02:56, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Continuing cleanup

I've been listing the categories at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Judaism as you requested, but have noticed you've been missing lately. Have had quite a bit of success! Am I supposed to update your internal final results list, too?

Meanwhile, there's a Deletion Review of a year+ old decision:

• Category:Fictional Jews (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2009 June 9#Category:Fictional Jews

-- watching here --William Allen Simpson (talk) 04:46, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

• Hi there. Keep up the good work. I am caught up with some other work at this time, but I am not far away. I will update my "file" eventually, you can place a record of all the deletions at the talk page there at User talk:IZAK/Deleting lists and categories of Jews. Thanks, IZAK (talk) 09:11, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

• Thanks for coming back again, and having a sense of humor, some of your comments at CfD today had me laughing out loud! My expression of humor has a tendency to be sarcasm, not always well received....
  --William Allen Simpson (talk) 16:44, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

• Thank you and you're welcome. I cannot fathom this obsession with listing every last Jew on Earth, dead or alive, partial of full blown, whether that Jew is even "Jewish" or not or whether they would want it or not. It's just tiresome trivia that warms the cockles of some people's hearts when if they want to be more serious and study and know about Jews and Judaism there are lots of better ways to do so, and Wikipedia has lots of material about that too! IZAK (talk) 06:18, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Feast of Trumpets Page

IZAK, I've been looking at the [Feast of Trumpets] page and the entire thing needs to be reformatted. There's alot of POV in it, there are alot of claims that need citation. I don't know what to do; I don't have the time needed to dedicate to its clean up. The page indicates that there is already a page for the Christian adherence to the Feast of Trumpets. That, to me, says that this page is intended to be about the Feast of Trumpets in the Tanakh. I'd like to just delete the majority of the page, but I am afraid I will hurt feelings and cause a fight. What, if anything, should I do? Or should I just leave it to those of you who are working on Jewish items? Thanks in advance, Rivka (talk) 03:45, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Rivka: Thanks for bringing this to my attention. I have fixed the Feast of Trumpets pages and made it into a WP:DISAMBIG page and I have moved all the blatantly pro-Christian missionary material to Talk:Feast of Trumpets (Christian holiday)#Material from Feast of Trumpets page) and I have given my reasons there that: "The following was from the Feast of Trumpets page that has nothing to do with normative Judaism of any kind and therefore this material needs to be absorbed into this POV article, if not deleted entirely for violations of WP:NOR; WP:NEO and WP:NOTMYSPACE. Thank you," and remember WP:BEBOLD! IZAK (talk) 06:35, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Merge

I've just proposed merging Unification Church and antisemitism (which you worked on) into Divine Principle. Please join in the discussion, if you like. Steve Dufour (talk) 15:48, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : XL (June 2009)

The June 2009 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.
This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 22:41, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Anti-Israel lobby in the United States

Hi! You might be interested in the discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Anti-Israel lobby in the United States. Thank you. Nsaum75 (talk) 08:04, 18 July 2009 (UTC) (Using {{Please see}})

Pay it forward barnstar

		Pay it forward barnstar
		Nerguy (talk) has given you a Pay it forward barnstar! Pay it forward barnstar promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day a little better. When you receive a Pay it forward barnstar, you should give it back to five other Wikipedia users within five days by adding {{subst:Pay it forward barnstar}} to their talk page with a friendly message.!

thanks for all the great work that you do to help wikiNerguy (talk) 15:56, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

• Thank you, much appreciated Nerguy! IZAK (talk) 13:15, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Brisk

Hi IZAK, I added this to the Brest-Litovsk article. Could you check it over to make sure I represented facts properly? Thanks, Tomer^talk 04:08, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : XLI (July 2009)

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Haredi Judaism

Oddly enough, I cleaned up a bit of a mess in the Haredi Judaism article just before you put that note on my page - Shirulashem brought up the issue 3 weeks ago on my Talk page. Jayjg ^(talk) 23:39, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

One of your edits is being queried

From the Rabbi article, an append of yours from 06:31, 29 March 2005 is being queried at the reference desk. You may want to comment. thanks --Tagishsimon (talk) 01:03, 29 August 2009 (UTC).

• Hi, thanks for contacting me. Honestly, I don't think that I wrote what is being questioned, it just is not what I write and the way I write it. I did however contribute some other material to the original article but it has been edited so many times in the past few years by so many people that it has changed so much over and over again. Thanks again, IZAK (talk) 12:21, 1 September 2009 (UTC)

Nominations open for the Military history WikiProject coordinator election

The Military history WikiProject coordinator selection process has started; to elect the coordinators to serve for the next six months. If you are interested in running, please sign up here by 23:59 (UTC) on 12 September!
Many thanks,  Roger Davies ^talk 04:24, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : XLII (August 2009)

The August 2009 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.
This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 20:08, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, IZAK. You have new messages at A More Perfect Onion's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

A More Perfect Onion (talk) 13:17, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

Military history coordinator elections: voting has started!

Voting in the Military history WikiProject coordinator election has now started. The aim is to elect the coordinators to serve for the next six months from a pool of sixteen candidates. Please vote here by 23:59 (UTC) on 26 September!
For the coordinators,  Roger Davies ^talk 22:09, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, IZAK. You have new messages at A More Perfect Onion's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

A More Perfect Onion (talk) 13:29, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Great work! -oh by the way......

Hi IZAK -Good work on all your Yom Kippur edits! I would ask a favour though: kindly add at least a short edit summary to every change being made. I and others scan dozens of edit changes to articles regularly for vandalism, and the lack of edit summaries is one of the tip-offs I use to check edits for that nonsense. Edits not having a change summary means spending more time manually scanning them. One way to lessen the burden of the summaries is to compile all the changes you'd like to make into a single edit, b.t.w. Thanks and keep up the good work.... HarryZilber (talk) 16:46, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Harry: Thanks for contacting me. I am definitely one who works hard to enter edit summaries. When I don't it's usually for minor edits or when I may be working "at high speed" when I am sometimes not that self-conscious about it while I am working to formulate an idea and how to phrase it according to Wikipedia guidelines. Mostly when it's minor I do try to check off and click on the "This is a minor edit" (which is indicated by the little "m" that shows us when you look at "(talk | contribs) m" in each edit summary) see Help:Minor edit, which therefore does not require me to fill in an explanation as to why I corrected a spelling mistake or put in commas etc. Thanks for your feedback and please stay in touch! IZAK (talk) 10:33, 24 September 2009 (UTC)
• FYI, Harry, in Help:Minor edit it states:

"A check to the minor edit box signifies that only superficial differences exist between the current and previous versions: typo corrections, formatting and presentational changes, rearrangement of text without modification of content, et cetera. A minor edit is one that the editor believes requires no review and could never be the subject of a dispute. An edit of this kind is marked in its page's revision history with a lower case, bolded "m" character (m).

...editors may choose to ignore minor edits when reviewing recent changes; logged-in users might even set their preferences to not display them...

Users who are not logged in to Wikipedia are not permitted to mark changes as minor because of the potential for vandalism. The ability to mark changes as minor is one of many reasons to register.

A good rule of thumb is that edits consisting solely of spelling corrections, formatting changes, or rearrangement of text without modification of content should be flagged as minor edits.

When to mark an edit as minor

• Spelling corrections
• Simple formatting (e.g. capitalization, punctuation, or properly adding italics to non-English words, like folie de grandeur)
• Formatting that does not change the meaning of the page (e.g. moving a picture, splitting one paragraph into two—where this is not contentious)
• Obvious factual errors (e.g. changing "Nixon resigned in 1874" to "Nixon resigned in 1974")
• Fixing layout errors
• Adding or correcting wikilinks
• Removing vandalism and graffiti"

Hope this clarifies for you. IZAK (talk) 10:45, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : XLIII (September 2009)

The September 2009 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.
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Template: Rabbi stub

I would appreciate your support in the discussion on Template talk:Rabbi-stub‎. Thank You. Nerguy (talk) 15:55, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Yom Kippur War

Hello there. The Yom Kippur War site is currently filled with revisionist rewrites of history, pushing an Egyptian POV and the article need lots of work. I'd like to collaborate with you on this. If you're interested. just leave a message on my Talk page. I've already made some corrections but encounter lots of reverts for no apparent other than expressing NPOV.--Jiujitsuguy (talk) 17:55, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Hello again. As expected, the few sourced edits that I made to the "Yom Kippur War" were almost immediately reverted because they do not express an Egyptian POV. I noticed that you were at one time active in making some good edits to the article. I could sure use a little help. Thanks again.--Jiujitsuguy (talk) 05:02, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Hi Jiu, thanks for contacting me. There must be a split between the views of the two warring sides, this was a war after all between enemies so it's crazy to think that one synthesized view can be hashed up. Create sub-sections like "The war from Egypt's perspective" and the "The war from Israel's perspective" -- as in any war both sides had their views for what happened and how they responded and what the results were etc. IZAK (talk) 07:55, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Question

Hi Izak: I was just drawn by another editor’s comment to a discussion in which I saw you make the following comment: “Nominator is also injecting gay isssues that have no evident logical or any other connection to this category beyond emotional hysteria value in violation of Wikipedia:Etiquette that have nothing to do with the reality of antisemitism which is not the same thing as being anti-gay.” This made me think. Let me say I can see that comparing types of prejudice is thorny, at the least, and I might also question whether the nominator has fully considered the rather unique history of anti-Jewish propaganda. I simply have to ask: “Emotional hysteria value,” for asking that a ruling as to articles on one minority group not be limited to that minority group? This seems to me a fairly common way of thinking. I wonder if you would stand by your remark. Regards, Mackan79 (talk) 08:22, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Mackan, I have been busy lately, just noticed your question. Asside from the nominal point of your question, what are you trying to really say or incite? There is no real equavalancy between Judaism issues and gay-related issues. Following your track one may as well start discussions about comparing people suffering from discrimination because they are ill or disabled and calling them a "minority" and then somehow tying that in with Jews who are also a minority, the word "minority" is not some sort of "magic glue" that can tie together the North and South pole of every argument or situation. Eskimos are also a minority. So what? They are like Jews? People stationed in Antarctica are also a minority, so what? They are not like Jews in any way. Sometimes arguments can and are pushed to absurd levels and it takes common sense and good judgment and healthy WP:NPOV not to go down useless slippery slopes that are of no meaningful value. IZAK (talk) 04:27, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks Izak, I just checked back on this. I wasn't meaning to incite anything, although I admit my comment was meant to be a little more provocative than it now seems. I had just thought it an awfully strong statement to make, that someone made this comparison for "emotional hysteria value." I imagine to them it wasn't intended to raise hysteria, or be cynical; the reality is that anti-gay propaganda has been noted, and may be considered a valid category to some. The category appears to have been deleted on a general principle that categorizing material as "propaganda" violates NPOV, even if reliable sources describe the material in that way. If so, it would seem the same reasoning could be extended to other categories of "propaganda" without equating them. I don't entirely remember now, but I believe that was my reaction, besides your use of such a strong word (which now has me reading about the rather bizarre history of hysteria, never mind that). I appreciate the explanation, in any case. Regards, Mackan79 (talk) 09:44, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Test your World War I knowledge with the Henry Allingham International Contest!

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The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : XLIV (October 2009)

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Help with Jewish philosophy article

I was wondering if an administrator can help with the Jewish philosophy article. This once fine article has been hijacked for many months by one person, who makes edits every few minutes, and has turned it into his own personal belief system.

This person made edits anonymous, many times a day, and simply rode roughshod over all others. Then he made a username, and now he does the same thing - sometimes every few minutes - for days and weeks on end. He is exhibiting bizarre, near pathological behavior with this article.

Nothing he is doing has anything to do with philosophy, nor does he cite references, nor does he follow any Wikipedia standards of community and cooperation. He has just totally taken over.

We need an admin to lock this article; find a reasonable, stable version, from about a year ago (or more) and then lock that version in until we can find out what is going on with this article & user.

RK (talk) 19:32, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

• Hi RK, good to hear from you after all these years. I am not an admin, I try to avoid that. But I would suggest you leave a general message at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Judaism that should get attention or try some admins like User:Avraham; User:Jfdwolff; User:Jayjg; and these users should be able to give intelligent input: User:Sirmylesnagopaleentheda; User:Briangotts; User:Yoninah. Hope this helps. Keep me posted. IZAK (talk) 01:39, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

Isn't it within Wikipedia policy to remove un-sourced material? That article bothers me too, though I have been respectful, exercised restraint, and even defended the editor against one massive attempt (about 2 weeks ago) at reverting it back to a long-ago stage. Bus stop (talk) 01:52, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

No, Bus stop, don't be hasty or harsh. Read this essay to better understand the "spirit" of Wikipedia: Wikipedia:Don't demolish the house while it's still being built. Remember, Wikipedia is all about building an encyclopedia, and building takes time. There are plenty of templates to place on a page or section requesting more citations see WP:NOCITE as an example, and there is no time-frame that says the citations must be put up or else zapped. If every word and sentence was deleted that had no source, three quarters of Wikipedia would vanish overnight. That is why there are discussion pages both on articles and with editors/users to talk about such things and arrive at WP:CONSENSUS. It's all part of a process. Even pregnancy takes 9 months until birth and getting to adulthood takes years, if ever. IZAK (talk) 02:04, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

Well put. Philosophical to my taste. Just so you know, this is where this subject has already been discussed. Bus stop (talk) 16:36, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

"otherwise this could lead to redundant forks like ... divorceable age in Judaism..."

Is there a specific age, in Judaism, for divorce, then? - Can a person be married but not be able to divorce simply on grounds of their age? Newman Luke (talk) 11:30, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

In regards to your point about marriageable age would lead to articles on divorceable age, child rearing age etc. I think it fails, on the grounds that marriageable age is a distinct recognised sociological/legal thing, whereas divorceable age, and child rearing age are not. Newman Luke (talk) 16:34, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Newman: I was pointing out that the direction you take can eventually lead to contemplating absurdity as well once one wants to detach minor subjects from their main headings that already exist. Looking at it from a different angle, how many articles are there about Marriageable age in Islam; Marriageable age in Hinduism; Marriageable age in atheism; Marriageable age in Christianity; Marriageable age in Shintoism. Why no objections to what I state in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Child marriage in Judaism? IZAK (talk) 03:09, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

• There always has to be a first article. At one point there wasn't an article about marriage in Islam, marriage in Hinduism, etc., yet there are now. How did that happen? The answer is that someone created/spun off an article about one religion in particular. They were the first. So it is here. Newman Luke (talk) 08:45, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Hello, IZAK. You have new messages at Newman Luke's talk page.
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Possible POV edits to Marriageable age in Judaism

I recognize that there are some pejorative connotations to the word pedophilia, but changing the wording there changes the meaning. If you have a source that indicates that these pre-pubescent marriages forbade sex until after they attained majority, that's one thing, as pedophilia would presumably not be a concern in such a case. But if there was sex, and it was not a concern at the time (which would not be unheard of, this was a long time ago, and marriages like this were not unique to Jews), then you are changing the meaning of the sentence quite significantly. Can you explain why your wording is more appropriate? --ShadowRanger ^(talk|stalk) 17:57, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Shadow, if that is your only concern then I fear that you reveal a darker more sinister and negative agenda to slander Judaism. The word "pedophilia" today only has negative connotations of forbidden, immoral and even illegal sexual acts. However, if there are reliable sources in Talmud, Torah and Jewish Law that allow for marriage of minors it cannot be labelled as "pedophilia" but feel free to call it "marriage of pre-pubescents in Jewish law". Thanks, IZAK (talk)
• I'd like to point out that paedophilia wasn't a concern in non-Jewish society until the mid 19th century, either. Mentioning paedophilia is simply to avoid readers putting their modern presumptions of what the motivation might be. If you say 'so and so outlawed child marriage' most people these days will assume the motivation was anti-paedophilia. If you say they outlawed it because they disliked some obscure ritual/right, people these days will generally still assume that the underlying motive was anti-paedophilia, and the dislike of the obscure ritual was some (genuine) excuse for disposing of child marriage. The only way to prevent this assumption is to explicitly mention that the suppression wasn't connected to motives of anti-paedophilia.

No-one involved here is claiming that the Talmud or Torah or Jewish law about marriage constitute peadophilia. What is being stated in that sentence is that suppression of child marriage wasn't due to motives of anti-paedophilia, the concern that would be the most likely motive behind such suppression if it had instead happened in modern times. Perhaps the sentence could be re-worded slightly to avoid you making what appears to be an honest misreading on your part. Newman Luke (talk) 00:19, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Izak, I take some offense at the idea that I'm trying to "slander" (technically, libel) Judaism. You are supposed to assume good faith, and I've given no indication that I have any particular "agenda" with regard to Judaism (heck, every page on Judaism I'm currently watching was a result of recent change patrolling, I didn't seek them out). If anything, I think I'm mildly biased in favor of Judaism, having been raised Jewish, but I try not to let that bias affect my editing. In any event, the point is that this is historical information. As I noted in my comment, this sort of behavior was common to most cultures and religions of the time. Concerns related to pedophilia didn't exist. As Newman Luke points out, the wording was chosen to inform people as to the motivations at the time which would not be obvious to modern day readers. It's not some backhanded way of saying that Rabbis and/or Jews are pedophiles and/or encourage pedophilia, any more than pre-19th century child marriage among any other culture or religion is a commentary on them. In some ways the Rabbis were ahead of their time; while their motivations were not the same as those of modern cultures, the end result was that they effectively forbade child marriage centuries before the rest of the world got around to it. --ShadowRanger ^(talk|stalk) 15:04, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Deletions and such

I nominated an article about what seemed to be a straight advertisement: Open Happiness. So watching the AfD boards I chimed in on a few. Ended up in the Marriageable age in Judaism debate. It's like a Wikipedia soap opera and I'm enthralled. Ended up looking at Jewish fundamentalism page and it is so full of weasel and peacock words and lacks so much citation; I haven't a clue where to start clarifying. You are more suited to that and wonder if you've looked at it before? Alatari (talk) 02:03, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Alatari. The article about Jewish fundamentalism is so stupid. I did do some work with it in years gone by, but not much. I can't promise, but why not try to get some interest by asking around at WP:TALKJUDAISM. Thanks, IZAK (talk) 13:15, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

I took a Wikication (what!?!, There is no Wikipedia Vacation slang?) and came back and it was already deleted. here are some sources I found in a few minutes. Is any of the original page usable? Alatari (talk) 07:33, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jewish fundamentalism

Can you please take a look? -Lisa (talk) 16:01, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

• Hi Lisa: It's a tough call because there is Category:Religious fundamentalism. Look through the latter thoroughly. IZAK (talk) 16:04, 17 November 2009 (UTC)