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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Lingbao School/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted by User:SandyGeorgia 21:51, 3 January 2009 [1].

Lingbao School edit

Nominator(s): Zeus1234 (talk)

I'm nominating this article for featured article because I believe it meets all the criteria set forth. Zeus1234 (talk) 10:12, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments - sources look okay, links checked out with the link checker tool. Ealdgyth - Talk 15:24, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments: I can't comment on the content as I lack any knowledge. Instead I'll suggest a few small improvements that might be adopted.

  • In the first para of the Rebirth section the word "Buddhist" or "Buddhism" is over-repeated (five mentions in all). A spot of rewording should deal with that.
  • "the adept's body..." An adept is a person with some particular skill or proficiency, and I'm not quite sure how this meaning suits your phrase.
  • "Sinicization" should be linked
  • "kalpa" should be linked at first rather than second mention.
  • It may be worth looking out for other specialist terms that should be either linked or explained. However, I believe the links on "sun", "moon" and "planets" are unnecessary overlinking.
  • Books in the list of references should have ISBNs

It looks an interesting and informative article. Brianboulton (talk) 18:08, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have made the fixes you suggested. Thanks for the help!Zeus1234 (talk) 08:10, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]


Support — Language is fine, and the article performs well as an introductory guide to Lingbao School (origins, beliefs, and legacy). Whatever jargon (deity names and spiritual terms) are much easier to identify than before. I think this qualifies as a Featured Article. Jappalang (talk) 05:00, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved issues. Jappalang (talk) 05:00, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments — generally the language is fine, but I removed redundancies and changed several sentences to avoid repetition and bad forms. Content-wise, however, this article might be confusing...

  • Language
  • First off, the article should be consistent. Is it US English or British English? "-ize, -or" are US English. "-ise, -our" are British English. Currently, the article is a mix, with "visualize" and "colour" as examples.
  • History
  • "Ge Chaofu did not claim to have had the scriptures revealed to him directly from the spirits, but rather from a line of transmission going back to Ge Hong's great-uncle, Ge Xuan (164-244)."
Are scriptures supposed to be by default revealed by spirits? This sentence seems to imply so. It is a surprise out of the blue, and it is rather pointless if it is not the default rule (which it is not). Hence, simply stating that the Lingbao scriptures were passed on generation to generation by word-of-mouth (or handed down) would be sufficient.
  • "Under the Tang Dynasty, the Shangqing School, better integrated with the aristocracy, was more influential in court. The Shangqing School, however, borrowed many Lingbao practices, thus further integrating the two schools."
Here, an unknown school is introduced, then revealed as a successor of the Lingbao School. The order is reversed. I also suspect that the "further integrating" should not be used in that manner. It would have been better to phrase, "Over the centuries, various teachings formed as offshoots of the Lingbao School. One of them, the Shangqing School, prospered in the Tang Dynasty. Borrowing many Lingbao practices, it was well accepted by the aristocracy and established an influence in court."
  • Rebirth
  • "These were reborn into earth prisons, as a hungry ghost, as an animal, as a man or as a celestial being."
"These" refer to what?
  • Cosmology
  • "kalpa cycles"
The what?! There is the article, kalpa (time unit), but for all I know, kalpa cycle might be talking about another thing.
  • "Deviating from Buddhist beliefs was that the heavens rotated around a huge mountain known as the Jade Capital, which was the residence of the Celestial Worthy."
I would suggest "Lingbao cosmology deviated from Buddhist beliefs by proposing that the heavens [...] Worthy.", and who is the Celestial Worthy?
  • "traditionally Daoist ideas"
I would hazard it is supposed to be "traditional Daoist ideas"
  • Please explain what is the Single Breath.
  • "is subdivided into three breaths that corresponds to three deities, the lords of the Celestial Treasure, of the Sacred Treasure and of the Divine Treasure."
Better punctuation is recommended here, I recommend a dash or colon between "three deities" and "the lords". Furthermore, first it was divided, then the breath was subdivided? This is getting confusing.
  • "During the subsequent three cosmic eras in the three Daoist heavens, these three lords introduced the teachings of the Dadong (Great Grotto), the Dongxuan (Mysterious Grotto) and of the Dongshen (Divine Grotto). These three teachings form the basis for the later classification of texts in the Daozang."
Lots of "three"s and an expectation of the reader to know of the cosmic eras in Daoist heavens. What are they?
  • "the emperor of the colour that was associated with that era would descend onto earth"
Most people would think of an emperor as a mortal. Who is this "emperor" who came from the heavens? He deserves clarification.
  • "the Nine Breaths of the universe"
Nine? I thought the Single Breath was divided into two, three, or was it six?
  • "ten thousand emperors"
Where did they (no mention of there being 10,000 before) come from? Are there supposed to be 10,000 colours as well?
  • Immortality techniques
  • "their essence coagulating and entering the body."
Bad form of "noun-plus-ing". See User:Tony1/Advanced editing exercises#A common problem—noun plus -ing.

Rituals

  • "These practitioners were not professional priests, but rather 'students of the Dao'."
Do you mean "Early practitioners" rather than "These practitioners"?
  • "meaning that it was carried on at several different levels simultaneously." and "In addition, rituals always involved three levels: heaven, earth and man."
These sentences can be merged.
  • "and in addition to preventing bad weather, also ensures salvation."
Suggestion: ", ensuring salvation and preventing bad weather."
The article seems to presume the reader has some insight into Daoist teachings (especially the Cosmology section), which makes it inaccessible to those who do not have an inkling to the teaching's gods and hierarchy. (update: I will re-read later to verify if this still stands.) Finally, the article fails to talk about the relevance of Lingbao School in the modern days. We are only vaguely told that it survives in some form, and those descriptions are scattered across the article. Jappalang (talk) 23:09, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have taken many of your suggestions to heart, and have tried to simplify much of the content, by standardizing terms and clarifying the language. I added a new legacy section at the bottom to synthesize the parts of the Lingbao School that are still relevant today. I am Canadian, and follow Canadian spelling, which is a combination of British and American spelling. I don't believe this to be too much of an issue. If you have any further suggestions, please let me know! Zeus1234 (talk) 08:09, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The lede needs to be fixed to summarize the changed article (right now, it states the Single Breath, which is no longer stated in the text; furthermore, the present day situation of Linbao School needs to be accounted for in the lede). Jappalang (talk) 13:12, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I just completed to two fixes to the lede that you suggested. Thank you for the suggestions.Zeus1234 (talk) 02:13, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Actually a preference for -ize is fully compatible with a preference for -our even before we considering Canada, thanks to "en-GB-oed". That little matter aside, the spelling of the article seems to be in accordance with an emerging quasi-standard for Canadian spelling of English as I infer it from this explanation. Morenoodles (talk) 09:29, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
As long as there is a standard, then it would not be an issue. Jappalang (talk) 09:52, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Dabs; please check the disambiguation links identified in the toolbox. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:21, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done. Morenoodles (talk) 09:44, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Image review — as follows:

  • File:Ge Xuan.jpg — Source given, but it is not the page the picture exists. Please provide the link to the page where the picture is shown by this site (not the direct url of the picture). Furthermore, date of the picture must be provided by sources to prove public domain. Jappalang (talk) 22:15, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I located the image here but it is of smaller resolution. The page list four sources (I doubt it could be from the Records of the Three Kingdoms—Wu, so it might be from the other three), so it should be looked into from which book it came from. Jappalang (talk) 09:43, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Removed. Jappalang (talk) 01:44, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Removed. Jappalang (talk) 01:44, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have corrected File:Baopuzi.JPG to conform to what is needed. Please take a look and do likewise for the other two images. Jappalang (talk) 09:43, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I could not adequately source the other two images, so they have therefore been replaced with images that I was able to provide adequate sources for.Zeus1234 (talk) 11:50, 22 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
As of this revision, images check out fine. Jappalang (talk) 01:44, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Further comments — looking into the sources, several items are cited to The Encyclopedia of Taoism, which is a tertiary source. Can references to it be reduced? Wikipedia is aiming to be a tertiary source, and it is desirable for most (if not all) of its sources to be secondary per WP:PSTS. Jappalang (talk) 02:02, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I managed to get rid of all references to the encyclopedia except for 12 and 27. These are probably present in sources I don't have access to, as I've looked in all sources available to me for any other reference.Zeus1234 (talk) 09:06, 23 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Two references is not that major (requirements are for minimal use), so this is pretty fine. Jappalang (talk) 05:00, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I understand that this objection has been addressed and struck out, but I think it deserves a comment all the same. It strikes me as an extremely strict application, or even a misapplication, of "WP:PSTS". The "tertiary source" cited in this article is not a general-purpose work of reference that must ruthlessly or hurriedly crush knowledge and educated theory into a short space for casual or quick consumption. Instead, it's a special-purpose encyclopedia for which (or for half of which) the publisher charges $300, with signed articles; and the article cited here is written by somebody who's written other pieces that this article cites and who seems to know what he's talking about. Citing it seems perfectly proper to me. Morenoodles (talk) 09:10, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Quick-fail—1a: My head is spinning. Poorly organised ideas; repetitiveness. Here are examples just in the lead. The whole text needs a good massage. I think this should be withdrawn and put through a major clean-up.

  • "The Lingbao School is a synthesis of religious ideas that is based on Shangqing texts, the rituals of the Celestial Masters, and Buddhist practices." Somehow a little wordy. What about "The Lingbao School is a synthesis of religious ideas based on Shangqing texts, the rituals of the Celestial Masters, and Buddhist practices."? Or "The Lingbao School is a synthesis of the religious meanings in Shangqing texts, the rituals of the Celestial Masters, and Buddhist practices." Unsure.
  • "The beliefs of the Lingbao school were based on the Buddhist concept of reincarnation. The school's cosmology was also influenced by Buddhism, but still maintained many Daoist beliefs, including the idea that the world emerged from a type of qi called yuanqi, and that an apocalypse would occur that only a limited few could avoid through faith." Also? These sentences seem to contain repetitiveness/circularity. I'm confused.
  • "Laozi. Alongside Laozi," So reorganise the sentence boundaries to overcome this rep., and the noun+ing urchin, and the clumsy order of the phrases and groups: "One of its most important gods was the deified form of Laozi, alongside which were minor gods, some in charge of preparing spirits for reincarnation." That also solves the "important" but then "minor" (other minor gods) description of Laozi. Very confusing.
  • "Although reincarnation was an important concept in the Lingbao School, the earlier Daoist belief in attaining immortality remained." The logic of "although" will escape non-experts. "Likewise, Lingbao ritual was initially very similar to individual Celestial Master ritual, but went through a transformation that put more emphasis on collective rites." Why "Likewise"? I can't see the connection. Why "but"? Can a transformation put more emphasis on something, or lead to more emphasis? What a mess. Tony (talk) 15:35, 1 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Shanqing" is linked twice in a few seconds. More to the point, its very appearance twice at the top of the lead seems repetitive or redundant. The relationship between the first and second paras needs to be more logical and cogent.
    • I've looked over the lead, and have edited it as per your suggestions. I kept the sentence "Although reincarnation was an important concept in the Lingbao School, the earlier Daoist belief in attaining immortality remained." There is an although because reincarnation seems to be diametrically opposed to the idea of immortality. If you have the ability to reincarnate, why would you seek immortality? I hope that clarifies things.
    • As for the rest of the article, I looked it over and gave it an edit. However, it has been looked at by other editors already, so if you have any significant problems with the rest of the article, if would be very helpful if you tell me where so I can fix them. Zeus1234 (talk) 01:10, 2 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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