Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests/Jesus

Jesus

This nomination predates the introduction in April 2014 of article-specific subpages for nominations and has been created from the edit history of Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests.

This is the archived discussion of the TFAR nomination for the article below. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article/requests). Please do not modify this page.

The result was: scheduled for Wikipedia:Today's featured article/December 25, 2013 by Bencherlite ^Talk 12:10, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Jesus (7–2 BC to 30–33 AD) is the central figure of Christianity, whom the teachings of most Christian denominations hold to be the Son of God and the awaited Messiah of the Old Testament. Virtually all modern scholars of antiquity agree that a historical Jesus existed, although there is little agreement on the reliability of the gospel narratives and how closely the biblical Jesus reflects the historical Jesus. Most scholars agree that Jesus was a Jewish preacher from Galilee, was baptized by John the Baptist, and was crucified in Jerusalem on the orders of the Roman prefect, Pontius Pilate. Christians believe that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of a virgin, performed miracles, founded the Church, died by crucifixion as a sacrifice to achieve atonement, rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven, from which he will return. The great majority of Christians worship Jesus as the incarnation of God the Son, the second of three Persons of a Divine Trinity. A few Christian groups reject Trinitarianism, wholly or partly, as non-scriptural. In Islam, Jesus is considered one of God's important prophets and the Messiah. (Full article...)

Christmas – the celebration of the birth of Jesus, the central figure of a world religion.--FutureTrillionaire (talk) 17:46, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support. Duh. It's great to see a topic like this show up here. Taylor Trescott - ^{my talk} + _{my edits} 17:50, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose, unless this article is fully protected on Christmas Day. The typical level of vandalism seen on TFAs could potentially be seen as offensive to Christians on that day. Eric Corbett 20:00, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
7 points (vital article, traditional anniversary of his birth, no similar articles in six months). However, blurb is too short at c.930 characters instead of close to a 1,200 characters limit. Bencherlite ^Talk 20:22, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Okay. I've added some info. I think it's now at 1,145 characters.--FutureTrillionaire (talk) 20:53, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support. But agree with Eric. It will have to be fully protected. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:16, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Tricky to summarize, - for example: why mention Virgin birth but not teaching to love your enemies, why not simply "incarnation of God"? "Founded the church" might also be debatable, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:32, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's not that hard to summarise I don't think, but of course Jesus wasn't an incarnation of God, he was an incarnation of the Son of God. Eric Corbett 21:39, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I can't think of anyone more appropriate than you to found a new heresy! Johnbod (talk) 14:41, 13 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If anyone here could. This one is already taken; it is called Sabellianism. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:30, 15 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support, and treat the same as any other TFA. There is no need to defend against the possibility of people choosing to be offended by hypothetical vandalism. Reso lute 21:43, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The vandalism isn't hypothetical, it's inevitable. Eric Corbett 21:55, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
And inevitably reverted in a matter of moments. There is honestly no good reason to treat this article any different than any other TFA. Reso lute 22:30, 11 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Don't we have better things to do on Christmas Day than watch over an article waiting to revert vandalism? Eric Corbett 19:54, 12 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That is an argument against running a TFA at all. It is not an argument for giving this article special treatment. Reso lute 14:46, 13 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support and echo the request for full protection. I'd rather drink eggnog and deal with tedious, obligatory once-a-year family interaction than click "undo" a few hundred times when some anonIP adds in the illuminating "jesus was gay lol" factoid.--ColonelHenry (talk) 22:34, 12 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- It is already indefinitely semi-protected, so no IPs or new users will be editing the article on Christmas Day. I would have thought that those most likely to be offended by temporary vandalism on a Jesus TFA will be the least likely to be surfing the web on 25th Dec. Bencherlite^Talk 08:01, 13 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  - Just noticed that. Likewise, the 10-year olds perpetrating the vandalism on other days likely will be too busy with their toys and Xbox because "Santa is da shit yo" to think about Jesus. ;-) --ColonelHenry (talk) 15:03, 13 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. Do we really want to put a vital article on a day with one of the lowest readers? And when, as Bencherlite points out, many people who might be gratified to see this on the main page will be least likely to look. Espresso Addict (talk) 12:22, 13 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, we do: per Iri, perhaps the less people see this one, the better. And I endorse semi-protection. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:07, 13 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support. I also recommend full protection for this, perhaps also with a day or so buffer either side. I think in the circumstances special treatment is warranted. —Cliftonian (talk) 08:52, 16 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support - the article seems to be in decent condition, especially for the importance of its subject, and I think it would do the project well to display it on such a relevant date. I don't think viewership is inherently lower on Christmas Day... people are doing different things at different times UTC around the world. – Juliancolton | ^Talk 23:38, 21 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose if protected One of the nice features of TFA is that it gives new editors (or returning editors like myself who aren't yet autoconfirmed) the opportunity to edit high-profile, supposedly well reviewed articles. I don't know if there's specific policy on posting protected articles, but I don't really like the "post, if protected" theme that's been brought up by several editors, because it runs contrary to that type of participation for the sake of...convenience. If it's important enough to be TFA, surely it can be unprotected and monitored closely enough by the community, and protected if there is a massive amount of uncontrollable vandalism. It doesn't feel quite right to require a specific TFA to exclude a large group of potential editors ahead of time. X2Y2k6 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 02:47, 26 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Support and recommend full protection based on the following rationale:

1. From what I recall from a Google News story this page and George Bush, etc. are the top 10 most war zone pages on Wikipedia. So this is not "just another page". It was one of the most volatile pages identified in that study.

2. This page will be most likely protected on that day in any case, once contention takes place. It is just not clear what it will show.

3. I recall John Kerry joking during the last election that one of the candidates was like Wikipedia: he could not be trusted because what he said changed every few minutes. So Kerry's perception was that Wikipedia content is haphazard. But perhaps the front page article should be less haphazard than the rest of the pages, at least for 24 hours.

4. Is there any edit that is so crucial that can not wait 24 hours? Most probably not. And after all, why agree on the "blurb" above and get it into a suitable form if the page will become haphazard. I assume the blurb will not be editable however. Is that so?

In any case, should the page not achieve full protection on that day, a reasonable "pre-agreement" would be that if things get out of control, and the page does get protected, the protection will default to a version that was stable as of the date the closing of "this discussion", and then the mayhem can resume after 24 hours. But the mayhem may not even resume, thereafter. So that would be a reasonable precaution in any case, and would avoid unnecessary indeterminacy. However, a day or two of protection would be the obvious route away from the type of indeterminacy John Kerry was joking about. Scholarly comments (talk) 05:57, 26 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support if some form of protection. Given this, maybe it is time we revisit how we feel about mainpage protection - so Wikipedia_talk:Today's_featured_article#Is_it_time_to_revisit_the_protection_status_of_the_article_featured_on_the_main_page.3F Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 19:38, 28 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support along with protection. This is the obvious choice for Christmas day. HoloNet Kamino (talk) 15:19, 3 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - given the comments above about protection (reasonable) and the relative lack of active editors on Christmas Day, perhaps this would be a good case for using pending changes protection while it's TFA?

Support with or without full protection. Most. obvious. choice. ever. Surprised it has not been up before. Montanabw^(talk) 06:55, 13 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support and comment - The protection issue seems to be moot on both sides. User:X2Y2k6 brought up a great point earlier, about TFA's being the focal point for new/unregistered users to take the plunge into editing. But it's moot, because the article is semi-protected. Likewise, most editors here have requested the page be protected to prevent the vandalism of an article on the basis of causing offence. This is contrary to WP:NOTCENSORED in my opinion, as we cover a great number of topics that would surely be more offensive to the Orthodox Christian. The point is also moot, because the semi-protection on the article prevents all but dedicated vandals or existing editors from causing damage. The former will hardly be found in numbers to warrant full-protection; the latter presumably will not behave in such a manor lest they be blocked for a day. - Floydian ^τ _¢ 07:08, 13 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose! I studied religion and history, and have a masters focused on ancient civ. This is just plain wrong: "Virtually all modern scholars of antiquity agree that a historical Jesus existed," There isn't a definition of Jesus that is agreed upon by historians. The article says "scholars" say Jesus is defined by being baptised by John the Baptist and crucified. There were many, many people of that time who were (according to legend) baptised by John and crucified by the Romans. So that can't define Jesus. So what does? There's no agreement. While there are many biblical scholars who believe in Jesus, there are very few unbiased historians who will say it "commands universal assent" that he existed. Howunusual (talk) 20:48, 13 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]