Talk:Judaism

Oldest surviving religion?

Is this a joke? Why is there no proper citation for this claim? Instead of citation, there is a link to a kids' homework essay website (where you can "purchase anonymous essays for better grades")[1] and another one is an anonymously authored pdf file[2] on a music website run by Jewish people. I can't believe this kind of stuff is glaring into the reader's eyes on such a major article. Neither of the sources are valid (forget scholarly) sources! They do not even list the name of the authors or references. Will somebody remove this claim of being the oldest religion in the absence of any scholarly sources? And please do not point me to go to some archived chat on this talk page as I have read everything and concluded that it is a hollow claim, unbecoming of an encyclopedia. --70.64.86.187 (talk) 14:01, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Your conclusion goes against consensus. In addition, just for my personal interest, does anybody claim otherwise? In any case, instead of screaming to high heavens, perhaps you should look for some sources yourself... Debresser (talk)

I am sorry to have hurt your (religious? scholarly?) beliefs. Seriously, are you asking me to find sources when you have none? Are you aware that "Wikipedia is not a democracy"? Refer to WP:POLL. I do not see the consensus. I agree with the oldest surviving monotheistic religion part but I completely disagree with the claim of Judaism being the oldest surviving religion for two reasons:

1) There is no scholarly source making this claim. Even the kids' homework is not making that claim. So, who is making this uncited claim? Someone's prejudice? I still am shocked to see that you guys are defending an anonymous kid's high school homework paper as a legitimate source of knowledge, to be honorably quoted on the Wikipedia.

2) Credible sources (like Encyclopaedia Britannica [3]) are saying that another religion is the oldest surviving religion. On the Wikipedia article on Hinduism, the exact same claim is made but with reliable sources (See WP:SOURCES):

Among its direct roots is the historical Vedic religion of Iron Age India and, as such, Hinduism is often called the "oldest living religion" or the "oldest living major religion" in the world.

So, my question is: which page on the Wikipedia is to be trusted in this regard? The one with reliable scholarly sources or the one with anonymous self-published pdf files? Or should we just leave the readers confused? I still do not understand why the name of the authors are not given and they are considered scholarly sources. Where were these cited works published? Where are the references in the works? These essays are saying "God made a pact with Abraham..." and so forth. How can this be even taken seriously if the article is assuming that all the God pact story is actual historical fact? Any way, that's the besides the main point. The real issues here are reliable sources, self-published sources, verifiability and original research (by anonymous teenage prodigal scholars).

Now let us examine the scholar "noel12" from Texas who wrote this high school homework paper. On the cited source, the said scholar claims to be 15 [4] at the time of writing this scholarly article. Do we still need to talk about WP:V in this regard? The other cited source (a music website run by Jewish people) does not even have a title or name of the author or date of publication or anything except the bold claim that Judaism is the oldest religion.

Please do not take this personally or anything (I really wish to stress this twice); I just like to see Wikipedia as a reliable encyclopedia. Is it more about reflecting personal sentiments or providing credible knowledge, cited with scholarly sources?

In summary, I say that the uncited claim of Judaism being the oldest surviving religion be removed, while keeping the oldest monotheistic religion part and keep Wikipedia a serious, unbiased encyclopedia. Hope I have appealed to your better judgement.

--70.64.86.187 (talk) 23:23, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

70.64.86.187, you're misreading it completely, it says that Judaism is ONE OF the oldest MONOTHEISTIC religions in the world, not "the" oldest surviving singular religion in the world. There is a big difference between both statements in English (not just in American English, but all fluent varieties of it). That one bad source (which I removed) was one of many other (good) sources for that statement, so the statement is not disqualified because of that one bad (and now removed) source. Don't make a mountain out of a molehill.

Also, assume good faith, your statement "I am sorry to have hurt your (religious? scholarly?) beliefs" was inappropriate and is totally out of line. Ian.thomson (talk) 01:14, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Hey, Ian, thanks for the English lesson; sorry for being loud. Don't think citing homework papers is a molehill issue on an encyclopedia. Any way, cheers(?)! (Not sure if you drink)--70.64.86.187 (talk) 01:44, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

IP user, regarding "oldest religion," the article does not claim that, it claims it is one of (implying there are more than one) the oldest monotheistic religions. Citations are already given for that part, neither of which are the ones you mentioned.

The citations you mention are for the second half of the sentence discussed in the first paragraph. That one states that Judaism is the oldest monotheistic (implied because of the first part of the sentence) to survive into the present. The two cites for this part, as you pointed out, are not exactly the best. I have added another one that is better (from PBS). That PBS article states "Judaism is the oldest surviving monotheistic religion, arising in the eastern Mediterranean in the second millennium B.C.E." As added explanation for you, the next oldest after Judaism is Zoroastrianism (whose status of "monotheistic" is debatable depending on perspective and period), which arose sometime in the first millennium BCE (thus why it is later than Judaism, which originated, by some accounts, in the second millennium as quoted above).

Please also read Talk:Judaism/Archive_21#The_oldest_living_religion.3F as pointed out by Debresser earlier on this talk page — al-Shimoni (talk) 17:19, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Could we restructure the sentence that it implies oldest living monotheitic religion? Because it totally gives the wrong impression, there are religions such as Hinduism, though not monotheitic, did date as old as 1700 BC, the time when the Rigveda was written. Plus the citation given is restricting itself to only the Middle East, nowhere is the rest of the world mentioned, could you please search for an alternate citation? Cheers! Écrivain (talk) 10:49, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

One of the problems that haunts this article, and that on Hinduism and others, is the very issue of continuity. All mainstream movements of Judaism today claim continuity with the religion of Moses or even of Abraham, but some historians view Judaism as dating back to the 1st century CE. Obviously, the inhabitants of Judea and the Galilee (and Babylonia) in the first century had grand-parents, great-grandparents, greeat-great-grand parents, but the religion they practiced was different in major ways. Likewise, some historians view Hinduism as a religion that emerged in the 19th century (Pankaj Mishra for example argues that it was invented by the British and their Brahmin allies as an instrument for their policy of indirect rule and divide and conquer (dividing Hindus and Muslims) in the 19th century). It incorporated texts dating back thousands of years (like Judaism) and diverse practices ... but it is not at all clear that all inhabitants of the subcontinent (excepting Muslims and Sikhs and other religions not considered Hindu) in the 18th or 17th century believed that they were practicing the same religion and that their religion was called Hinduism. Andif we say that Jews today practice a religion that incorporates and interprets texts dating back to three or four thousand years ago, Christians can say the same thing. Slrubenstein | Talk 12:46, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Hinduism as a religion that emerged in the 19th century is purely uncited and absurd. The British had done nothing,but be the common enemy for all people in India, regardless of faith - a fact that any self respecting Indian will give a nod to (Read this for the reason of Pankaj Mishra's ideology here ;) ) . Firstly, one aspect which might be difficult for non-followers of Hinduism to fathom is that Hinduism is not a religion, but a way of life, hence being referred to as 'religious tradition' rather than a religion in History of Hinduism. This common culture that pervaded the Indian way of life was prevalent from 2000 BC, when the Vedic Sanskrit grammar was drawn up, and the word 'Hindu' first appeared in mainstream culture. No one sage, scholar or teacher advocated Hinduism, it was something that was derived from nature worship that lead to a culture and a way of living, and in modern terms - a 'religion'. And by the fact you stated saying its unclear as to the nature of the religion practised in the Indian subcontinent in the 17th and 18th century, let's make it clear, a 2 min walk from my home is a 1000 year old Hindu temple still active - Pataleshwar caves, and so are many temples throughout the country. Initially it started with the Hindu culture, with Islam arriving via conquests and trade relations - here So, leaving that false fact, yes, you're right, the issue of continuity haunts this article. As you pointed out by the 'differences over the years' part, no one religion burst to its present form, it was shaped by the current events of every time and modified unwittingly by man for his convenience. All we can do at present is search for solid, reliable, unbiased sources to correct this fact as best as possible :) , Regards --Écrivain (talk) 13:25, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

I wrote "some historians" and that is all I meant. You on the other hand speak for all billion Indians, and if any of them do not agree with you they drop into the "not self-respecting" category, and if a historian disagrees with you they are just wrong. Well, ho hum, we have seen this kind of POV-blindness over and over again at WP. Fortunately, our encyclopedia is governed by an NPOV policy which means that any self-respecting WP editor strives to include all significant views, especially ones we personally disagree with, because this is how knowledge grows. Sorry to have hurt your feelings! :) Slrubenstein | Talk 17:40, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

None of my feelings were hurt. Why did you suppose so? In any case, your "problem" here seems to be based on a misunderstanding. The article says that Judaism is the oldest monotheistic religion to survive till present day. What is incorrect about that? Debresser (talk) 16:33, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Oh, I'm sorry my friend. I really didn't mean to impose my ideas, sorry if it seemed so, I truly am. I did agree with you on many levels, just the 2 I didn't. I do not wish to challenge anyone nor be biased in any way. Yes, the 'self respecting' part was an overstatement, and I regret it. Even I want to know the facts, and am trying to find it too, but the shroud of history is playing with me :P . Once again, no offence :) Écrivain (talk) 18:47, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Sure, no problem. Debresser (talk) 23:10, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

General Remarks on Judaism in Wikipedia

My constant online survey of the many pages written on this subject when in search of information frequently fill me with frustration because of two things: 1) the use of BC/AD instead of the neutral BCE/CE is still commonplace, and Judaism does not define time in terms of Jesus of Nazareth, whom the Christian religion considers to be the "Christ," or Messiah" but Judaism does not (this is also a problem when looking up Christian and Islamic references); and 2) Christian contributors to Judaic entries commonly substitute the words "Old Testament" for books as varied as the Tanakh, the Torah, the Septaguint, and any other books originating with Judaism. In addition, Christian contexts of the order of books in the Tanakh frequently fall ignorant to one of the primary differences between Tanakh and any "Old Testament," from any Christian sect — the movement of the book of Malachi to the end of the Old Testament, to preface the coming gospels of the Christian Testament, when the Tanakh ends with Chronicles. The entry on Elijah is one such piece that made that mistake, and while I fixed it as best I could, my editing knowledge is not up to the task of moving one section within an article to a different placer in that article. Thanks for reading. Rtelkin (talk) 22:55, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

Not the right place for such discussions - noting that "Tanakh" != "Old Testament" so fights over ordering of books is pretty useless. "Old Testament" is far more common that "Tanakh" in general references, and asking that references must abide by orthodox principles is not found in WP:RS. For using year numbering, alas - the general world uses the same system, and asking that Wikipedia use another system would be rather confusing to readers for whom the religious implication is unlikely to hold much weight. Cheers. Collect (talk) 23:23, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

New stuff goes at the bottom. Also, this article uses BCE/CE. Ian.thomson (talk) 23:05, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

You might get a better response and more support at WT:WikiProject Judaism. This page is intended for discussion about how to improve the article about Judaism, not for a general discussion of Jewish topics. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 23:12, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

Caption correction

"Zachreinu" in one of the pictures does not mean 'we will remember,' as is translated in the caption. It means 'remember us.' Someone should correct this. -MH 38.117.214.70 (talk) 04:48, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Y Done Correct; good catch. Thanks. -- Avi (talk) 04:54, 8 February 2012 (UTC)