Talk:Religion

One of the worst articles I have seen

Pretty much every aspect of this article is bad. From the definition of religion to most of the individual sections. for example the section on religious beliief and judiasm claims that "a belief in God is not a requirement expressed by God anywhere in the Tanakh" which is totoally ridiculous. It the literally the most repeated thing in the torah, the main book of the tanakh. And its actually in the ten commandments (the crib notes version of judiasm) several times. And I couldn't believe there is no history section at all. which is what I came to the page looking for. As far as most of this page is concerned Judiasm is the first religion. Its really terrible. Obviously its locked so I'm not going to research all the edits and do it myself but it really needs a lot of work 68.188.25.170 (talk) 09:08, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

I am sympathetic to how you feel, but alas, the way things work around here involves a lot of compromise and negotiation. If, perhaps, you become interested in doing so, it would be very nice if you decide to stay around and create a registered account so that you can help make the page better. And in the mean time, I hope that you can find the information you are looking for at History of religion. --Tryptofish (talk) 13:31, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree with OP. Terrible Article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.127.120.45 (talk) 22:43, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Polly want a cracker? Because, it's not like actually suggesting improvements would be more helpful that just saying "I agree" or anything. Ian.thomson (talk) 23:10, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree terrible article. The negative perspective of religion is half or more the text if the list of religions is omitted. Positive perspectives are loosely and arbitrarily described in a few sentences. Thus, someone could easily come to the conclusion that religion must be definitely a bad thing. Also definition must be reedited and should contain more views as a complex subject that is, not only etymology. Also, the Christian concept has more space here than it should.--Κλειδοκράτωρ (talk) 16:45, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

There's no doubt that this is a dreadful article, and many appear to agree. Part of the problem is that we have so many different ideas of what is "religion". Therefore, it's possible that this article will never get anywhere until we come to grips with the many egregious definitions of the word. I would think that the first paragraph should at least have a workable definition of "religion", perhaps contrasted with the definition of "cult". Without a solid definition in principle, this article will never get anywhere. At the very least, it should be recognized that a religion is an organized method of teaching something, whether Christianity - or engineering. Then the rest of the article would flow effortlessly. But by starting out with wooly, half-baked, statements like "[Religions] tend to derive morality, ethics, religious laws or a preferred lifestyle from their ideas about the cosmos and human nature", well, the article is doomed to fail. Santamoly (talk) 07:24, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Criticism section

It is consistent with other philosophy articles that there be a link to the criticism article and/or a short summary of it. There is no reason (I can think of) why religion should be exempt. Examples: anarchism, atheism, existentialism, pragmaticism, secular humanism (controversy section), etc. byelf2007 (talk) 25 August 2011

Well, WP:OTHERTHINGSEXIST ain't a valid argument for your added section. Yes, criticism is always considered a part of controversial topics, and usually have a section of critics' opinions. However, that's not the case here. Criticism of Religion is a large parallel article, and a "see also" is where it belongs, IMHO. Btw, I don't see a criticism section for Atheism as you claim, and it falls into similar account. It's just mentioned their, not a dedicated "criticism" section. ~ AdvertAdam ^talk 18:29, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Also, I think you should take-a-look at Religion#Secularism_and_irreligion. ~ AdvertAdam ^talk 18:35, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Fair enough about the "other things exist" point, and I didn't see that "criticism of religion" is already linked. So why not have a criticism blurb separate from the rest of the article? I think it's good to have that near the end. If you don't like criticism blurbs in other articles, does that mean you want those removed? If not, what is your rationale for having them there but not here (I like format consistency in articles). Furthermore, having "criticism of religion" in the "modern issues in religion" section implies that criticism of religion has only occurred in modern times. I think it would be better if we had what I put in and eliminate the other "criticism of religion" link. Byelf2007 (talk) 27 August 2011

So, you simply admit that you haven't closely read the article :p. First, this is not the talkpage of those articles, and I'm honestly not involved in them to give my option.

Second, what you're suggesting is like adding a focus on criticism. "Issues of religion" is the same as "problems/criticism of religion," so that's the relevant place for it, according to this article's style (also Atheism's). Yes, "modern" is a good catch, which is simply inaccurate because it's reported that there was critics since the 5th century BCE. I just removed it. Btw, even the used tag is "main article" not a "see also".

Do you have further concerns :). ~ AdvertAdam ^talk 19:56, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

A problem with a short section on Criticism, serving mainly to have a link to the Criticism of religion page, is that it really doesn't say very much. Obviously, this page isn't the place for every criticism that has ever been raised, and I think that the material in the Secularism and Irreligion section probably covers what we need here, although I suppose one could add some further content there. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:23, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm good. byelf2007 (talk) 27 August 2011

The splitting out of the "Criticism Section" and making a separate "Criticism Article" is a direct violation of the neutral point of view policy. Specifically, refer to Breaking out trivial or controversial sections. Also see WP:CFORK, from which I quote "A point of view (POV) fork is a content fork deliberately created to avoid neutral point of view guidelines, often to avoid or highlight negative or positive viewpoints or facts. All POV forks are undesirable on Wikipedia, as they avoid consensus building and therefore violate one of our most important policies." Furthermore, the Religion article does not even mention the criticism anywhere. The ideal would be to completely incorporate the criticism directly into the text (i.e. merging the criticism article with the religion article). Since that has not been done, we must at least have a criticism section in the religion article. Right now, the criticisms have been deliberately removed from the article creating a POV fork!

Also note Wikipedia's policy on Tag-team editing: Tag teams work in unison to push a particular point of view. Tag-team editing – to thwart core policies (neutral point of view, verifiability, and no original research); or to evade procedural restrictions such as the three revert rule or to violate behavioural norms by edit warring; or to attempt to exert ownership over articles; or otherwise to prevent consensus prevailing – is prohibited.

In conclusion, the Religion article requires a criticism section to abide by Wikipedia's guidelines. The following banner must be placed on the Religion page as well. JacoLink (talk) 17:02, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved. (November 2011)

I am disappointed to see that nobody responded to this post and that no administrator had the courage to do the right thing and put the disputed neutrality banner on the main page.184.161.195.19 (talk) 04:35, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

I agree. No courage to stand up to Religion174.0.218.219 (talk) 06:26, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Guys, try actually looking before complaining: We have a Criticism section in the religion article, and we even have a Criticism of religion article. The criticism article is longer than the religion article. Placing it in this article would violate WP:UNDUE. The article includes a lot of specific criticisms of specific religions (instead of general criticism of the subject broadly), which violates WP:SYNTH. Pushing a bias against religion does not deal with any sort of bias for religion. Ian.thomson (talk) 16:33, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Hey Ian, try actually reading WP:UNDUE before responding to a complaint. From that I quote "Keep in mind that, in determining proper weight, we consider a viewpoint's prevalence in reliable sources, not its prevalence among Wikipedia editors or the general public." The criticism of religion page has 223 sources listed as opposed to the 75 listed on the Religion page. The criticisms of specific religions should be directly incorporated in the Religious Movements section and then they would not violate WP:SYNTH. Let us not forget that you have ignored the fact that the creation of two separate articles (Religion and Criticism of Religion) is "A point of view (POV) fork"..."a content fork deliberately created to avoid neutral point of view guidelines". WP:CFORK. Furthermore, it is the Religion article that is currently violating WP:UNDUE and WP:SYNTH. For example, the 'Religion and Violence' section serves to attack atheism, instead of describing the countless historical religious wars and the current ones in the middle east etc... I could go on like this for every section in the whole Religion article.

An administrator must put the following banner on the Religion page as there is an obvious dispute over the neutrality of this article! JacoLink (talk) 21:02, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved. (November 2011)

On a positive note, I am pleased to see that there is now a Criticism section in the Religion article and would call that a good start. We still need the neutrality banner to be placed on the main page and we should be working on merging the Religion article with the Criticism of Religion article. This would address other violations such as the violations of WP:CFORK, WP:UNDUE, and WP:SYNTH as described above. JacoLink (talk) 21:18, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Timeline.

Can someone please add to the see also section, the timeline for the appearance of known religions? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_religion#50th_to_11th_millennium_BC Please/thanks. Would be v helpful for studies. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.53.3.229 (talk) 20:28, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Done. Ian.thomson (talk) 20:36, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Removal

Under the Indian religion section, it states that Hinduism is not a monotheistic religion, when in fact it is. This needs to be changed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.164.142.186 (talk • contribs)

You're allowed to edit your comments, but quit removing the unsigned template unless you're going to sign your post (using four tildes, like ~~~~). Ian.thomson (talk) 23:43, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Religion and health

Could anyone add Impacts of religion on health to religion and health part. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Teddykra (talk • contribs) 13:15, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Done. Thanks for starting the article. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:22, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Sections: one more needed and one too long

I added a couple of quotes from anthropologists John Monaghan and Peter Just. There did not seem to be a good section to work them into. Perhaps one should be added discussing ethnography or another term that would encompass general statements of the types I added.

On an unrelated note, I question the length of the section called "Religion as a Christian concept". It seems excessive relative to the rest of the article. It certainly is notable, but the article itself defines religion in a broad manner that is inclusive of more than Christianity. I recommend pruning this section to be more concise or splitting it into its own article. --Airborne84 (talk) 04:22, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

About the "Christian concept" part of what you say, it's been an issue of discussion before. Please see Talk:Religion/Archive 9#New edits and Talk:Religion/Archive 9#Eurocentrism of the History section. --Tryptofish (talk) 15:51, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for adding an academic source to the article, but does the quote really accomplish what the heading suggests? Is there any history of any "prophet" in any religious tradition who came to a previously entirely irreligious society and then make it religious? The section title seems to suggest that we are going to read something about the origin of Religion, not the origins of the various specific religious traditions. This is a fascinating question (on the origin and universality of religion) that the article might helpfully address.65.71.203.98 (talk) 21:13, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Fair points. As I mentioned above though, there did not seem to be a good section in which to add the quote—which seemed useful in this article. Perhaps it belongs in an as-yet-uncreated section. --Airborne84 (talk) 21:51, 22 January 2012 (UTC)