Talk:The Poem of the Man-God

Excellent Work

I closely read this page (fixing minor grammatical errors as I went) and I found it to be balanced and informative in the best tradition of NPOV. My plaudits to the editors.

Estéban (talk)

Reliability of the Multidisciplinary Scientific Journal

@Arkenstrone: Multidisciplinary Scientific Journal is a MDPI journal which means that its not the sort of source we can use. What makes you think its reliable? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 13:33, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

MDPI used to be considered predetory, but no longer is. I think those two sources together are good, and Mattriciani has published on celestial mechanics so he knows what he is doing. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 21:15, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

It still seems to be considered predatory, also note that it has to be considered reliable... Not just not predatory. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:19, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Of course, seems to be is not the same as is. I seem to recall that at some point Wikipedia used to list MDPI as such, but that is no longer the case. And of course there is no "automatic death sentence" for all of MDPI journals, per WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. The issues are if the authors know what they are talking about (here they do) and if the subject is very complicated (here it is not) and if there has been any review in place (here it has). And it is confirmed by another journal, also MDPI, but obviously different reviewers. So it as had several reviews. So it is good. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 18:35, 29 July 2023 (UTC)

A MDPI walled garden of confirmation is not "good" Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:57, 29 July 2023 (UTC)

Actually that is a good and reliable statement for different reasons. First note that we assess reliability based on the likelihood that the statement by the authors may be in error, either because the authors did not know what they are talking about, or the problem is so complex that it may be inherently error prone. We also assess the likelihood that the reviewers in the sources may have missed that error. Here we have a very basic and simple statement that can be checked on a planetarium on a computer in "about an hour". I have tried it, anyone can try it to see how long it takes. What is the chance that a well educated person like Van Zandt made an eror doing that? Almost none. What is the chance that De Caro and Matricciani made the same error using a different planetarium? Almost zero. Note that the planetarium Van Zandt used was pre-internet and different from the one Matricciani used. What is the chance that 6 reviewers in 2 different journals all missed that eror, if one existed? Almost none. It would be very unlikely for all of these professionals to have made the same error. From another perspective, if there is an error in that statement, why did Bouflet not mention it? Bouflet wrote that he had been gathering all the criticisms of Valtorta for a while. If there had been even a hint of errors in Valtorta's astronomy Bouflet would have screamed about it. But the fact is that although people criticize Valtorta on various grounds from vanilla to theology, they know the astronomy has no problems. So given a statement that is easy to check in an hour, multiple authors using different systems, and the lack of any opposing sources, that is good and reliable statement. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 05:48, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

"First note that we assess reliability based on the likelihood that the statement by the authors may be in error" We do? Can you show me where it says that? We don't appear to be able to verify this information because it hasn't been published in a reliable source. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:04, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

33 AD vs 34 AD

Horse Eye, if you want to argue against Valtorta's astronomy, questioning its consistency is not the way because it is internally consistent. But we can question the fact that today most scholars prefer the date 33 AD rather than 34 AD. 34 AD can not be formally rejected but most scholars like 33 AD because of the issues about Paul's letters.

That would be a "reasonable" item to add to the article, and can be sourced in its own right. But I do not know how to add that given that none of those sources mention Valtorta. Is there a policy that lets us add that without doing WP:OR? Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 12:09, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't want to argue for or against Valtorta's astronomy, thats not we are here for. I have not questioned its consistency. You have correctly identified that it would be OR. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:07, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

I do wish we had a way to state that, but do not see one immediately. It would have been "reasonable" to let readers know that 33 AD is accepted by many more scholars, although 34 AD is not rejected in any formal way. Some people have said that Newton liked 34 because its date happened to fall on an English national feast day. Very few people discuss 34 AD because 33 has been more popular for long. But any way, C'est la vie. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 20:07, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

'Criticism' section could do with some cleaning up

The 'criticism' section on this page, (up until today when references to Sandra Miesel were added), uses a single source (Bouflet). Someone has point by point tried to refute each point raised in the article, not allowing the 'criticism' to stand as 'criticism.' Should there be another section for dispute about the work? 204.61.207.7 (talk) 19:20, 6 March 2025 (UTC)

I agree that Bouflet is overused, but it wasn't the only source... You seem to have missed the first paragraph "The earliest published criticism of the book was a January 1960 article in L'Osservatore Romano which called the book a badly fictionalized life of Jesus.[27] Between 1985 and 1993, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger wrote two letters which like the L'Osservatore article stated that the book was simply a story.[4] In 1992 Archbishop Dionigi Tettamanzi wrote a letter to the effect that the book does not have a supernatural origin.[7]" Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:40, 6 March 2025 (UTC)

The criticism section does need touch up, but not for the reasons stated by the IP, who does not seem to have done the very basic research on the subject. E.g. Sandra Miesell does have a Wiki page (not linked byt the IP) and she is no academic of any type.

The important recent item (Feb 2025) that needs to be added is this [1] which makes the statements by Ratzinger etc. redundant. Those were not official statements from Rome, this is an official statement that her work is not supernatural, and I will now add it.

Now, back to Miesell. Are you sitting down? Her early work was in "science fiction and fantasy criticism" (yes, yes) and she had previously studied biochemistry and medieval history, but never did a PhD. She is no expert on ancient history, or Valtorta's book. She is a very, very questionable source. And the comments at the end of her artcle make it clear that even those who read that publication (a borderline publication itself, with one editor who decides everything) think she has not studied the issues. E.g. she criticized Valtorta's Poem for using the words Yahweh and Geova, with Geova being a medieval term in the English language. Of course it was absolutely impossible for Valtorta to have written Yahweh, as the comments said, because the Italian language does not include the letters Y and W and they write Geova when they want to say Yahweh! She is no expert on the issues at all. I think, we should just skip her being unreliable, given thr rest of the issues with her background. The official statement from Rome makes her criticism very peripheral and uninformed now. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 22:21, 6 March 2025 (UTC)

Regardless of Miesel's credentials, the point she raises about the work's claim of the inadequacy of the Gospels is surely something worthy of inclusion in this article, no? She's criticizing the work on a very fundamental level of the sources of Christian revelation. NBWillia7 (talk) 05:09, 7 March 2025 (UTC)

Your statement begins with "Regardless of Miesel's credentials". This means that you know Miesel is not a WP:Reliable source. Wikipedia policy requires us to use only reliable sources. That is well known. So Miesel can not be used. That is that. Now, for your personal info, many other authors (often highly qualified) also claim that the gospels are inadequet, and you may order a few of Bart Ehrman's books to understand that issue. Further, people such as Fr. Ernesto Zucchini (a professor of theology) states that Valtorta's work fills the gaps that explain what the gospels do not [2]. He even a wrote a book about it. But, given that Miesel is not a reliable source, the other issues are beside the point. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 09:25, 7 March 2025 (UTC)

Miesel states in her article that "Although I’m a mere laywoman and no theologian, …" and it clearly shows, as she was unable to ascertain basic facts. For example, she says:

"Furthermore, on April 17, 1993, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith directed the Italian Bishops’ Conference to order this disclaimer placed in future re-issues of the Poem: “…the ‘visions’ and ‘dictations’ referred to in it are simply literary forms used by the author to narrate in her own way the life of Jesus. They cannot be considered supernatural in origin."

That is simply incorrect. Catholic scholar and theologian Fr. Anthony Pillari clearly states that this was Ratzinger's personal opinion and not that of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which had not held formal discussions on the issue, and hence had no juridic value.

In addition, the text to which she is confusedly referring to was a letter from Cardinal Tettamanzi who wrote to Emilio Pisani, the publisher of the Poem, requesting that a disclaimer be placed on the work. Once again, Fr. Anthony Pillari states that was the personal opinion of Tettamanzi, not of the Catholic Conference of Bishops, since no formal meeting was recorded as having taken place on the subject, which therefore caused Tettamanzi's position to have no juridic value.

With such basic errors in reporting multiple important historical facts, this source is neither reliable nor admissible. Arkenstrone (talk) 01:05, 7 March 2025 (UTC)