Talk:Nativity of Jesus

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: No consensus, therefore status quo ante proposita. That said, "The Nativity" might not be opposed were someone to boldy go. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 10:00, 27 February 2011 (UTC) The Bushranger _{One ping only} 10:00, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

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Nativity of Jesus → Nativity — This is the primary meaning of "[the] Nativity" in English. All other (common) uses are derivative and refer directly to this nativity, establishing the superior educational value of this topic. This article was in fact only moved from its original title (same as the proposed one) because it's content was focused on the birth of Jesus while its lede basically noted that "nativity" was a synonym for "birth". The article can have a hatnote to the DAB page and to birth. (By this proposal it is intended that Nativity be moved to Nativity (disambiguation).) Srnec (talk) 05:53, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *'''Support''' or *'''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's policy on article titles.

• Weak Oppose. But not a big deal at all, given that Nativity of Jesus will redirect there. Yet having the word Jesus in the page title reduces the chance for ambiguity. Good Olfactory's comment that "this topic is probably the primary meaning in English" already reflects the fact that the equation "Nativity = Nativity of Jesus" is probably well understood but not 100% right. I do, however, hope that we will not all talk for 3 years for a move that will make less than 0.000001% difference to the quality of content in Wikipedia. History2007 (talk) 08:31, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

• Support. Clearly the primary topic. -- Necrothesp (talk) 11:44, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose since it is a synonym for birth. 64.229.100.61 (talk) 14:16, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

  The word "reformation" does not exclusively refer to the Protestant Reformation, yet that is where it redirects, because "reformation" is not an encylcopedic topic anyway. We could say the same for Renaissance, except that is not even a redirect. I see we have The Holocaust, and I suppose we could go with The Nativity, but I don't know why we would do so when Holocaust redirects there anyway. But this shows that we recognise that occassionally common nouns come to refer predominantly to one historical instance of themselves. This is especially so when the common noun is not worthy of an article anyway (reformation) or is no in common use for any other purpose (nativity). Srnec (talk) 23:54, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

• This is because of WP:NOTDICDEF. Were someone to write an encyclopedic article about "reformation", religious and/or otherwise, (as opposed to "Reformation"), then the need would arise as which was the primary topic and of an eventual dab. When it come to "nativity" (as opposed to "Nativity" or "The Nativity"), there is a need of disambiguation, since it may refer to birth. ^walk victor falk ^talk 17:51, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

• Yet, there is no link to birth on the DAB page, although there is a link to the Wiktionary article for "nativity". This would work for the current article, too. I think my point stands, there is only one encyclopedia topic for the word "nativity" in the same way there is only one for the words "reformation" and "renaissance". Srnec (talk) 06:38, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

• Good thing to point out, {{sofixit}} [1] ^walk victor falk ^talk 17:23, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

• Support Per nominator. Obviously the primary topic, regardless of etymology. The Celestial City (talk) 19:47, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
• Support, despite my initial misgivings. I think on balance this is probably an appropriate change if it's desired. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 23:59, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose I would support The Nativity, but not plain old Nativity. ^rossnixon 02:12, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose Per my argument above. Neutral re. The Nativity and Nativity of Jesus. ^walk victor falk ^talk 17:51, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
• Support, but "The Nativity" would be better. Kauffner (talk) 10:34, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose Nativity, but Support The Nativity per Srnec's reasoning. Support per primary topic. Ajl^talk 12:47, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Feel free to ignore this, I just caught the timestamp... Ajl^talk 12:49, 26 February 2011 (UTC) I was tired when I wrote this, and someone pointed out to me that the discussion was still open anyways. Ajl^talk 22:18, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

No worries. Open, yes - alive, not exactly. Seven days have passed and it is time to close this and move on. I think the nominator can just withdraw it, given the current status of teh votes and we can move on. History2007 (talk) 22:51, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Discussion

Any additional comments:

• Comment. This topic is probably the primary meaning in English of "the Nativity", but it may not be for just the solitary word "nativity", which is what this proposal suggests moving to. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 08:17, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
• Comment "In population statistics, the birth rate or number of childbirths per unit of time." [2] ^walk victor falk ^talk 17:27, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

I think that was a good point Mr Falk. That point is a key obstacle to the use of Nativity. I did not know that disambig page was there. So Nativity is not a suitable name for this article, given that fact. And given that Nativity of Mary is also a well established term, then there is really no point in the rename. History2007 (talk) 17:35, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Name of Jesus's father

"Jesus being born near the end of Herod's reign and his father being named Joseph are considered historically plausible." They are? surely they both come from the gospel-writer's wish to show Jesus as the new Moses - so Herod is the wicked Pharaoh and Joseph is his father because the Joseph of Genesis immediately precedes Moses in the Torah. (Note that I'm not saying these theories are true, but the fact they exist means that you can't say that these two things are "considered historically plausible"). PiCo (talk) 23:24, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

I say go ahead and change it. It is no big deal really in my view. We can just say the Gospel says it was Joseph. That part is for sure, given all the Bible copies out there, the rest is subject to debate given that none of us was there at the time. I have no exact stats, but my guess is that 5% of the readers pay attention to that anyway. History2007 (talk) 00:08, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Nativity vs. infancy

It's a quibble, but in scholarly circles the nativity and the infancy are two separate narratives - the nativity is the birth story, the infancy is what follows, the attempt of Herod to kill the kill the child and the flight into Egypt. I've deleted some material. PiCo (talk) 10:37, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Where is the Eastern Christian perspective?

There are pictures of Nativity scenes which are fine for Roman Catholic or Protestants, but inappropriate in terms of Orthodox Christian teaching. You can see a picture of the Nativity as it was traditionally taught here. http://orthodoxwiki.org/Nativity_icon There should be a paragraph written re: that slight difference. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 15.251.169.70 (talk) 19:07, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Neutral Point of View

This article needs some clean up concerning neutral point of view. It talks of Jesus and disciples as if they are real historical people and as if the events recorded in the gospels are fact rather than things recorded in a text. I'm not challenging that many of these are Christian beliefs, but it takes a Christian-centric worldview rather than making it obviously separate from any particular religious viewpoint. As with the need for more incorporation of Eastern Christian perspective, the article needs to bear in mind that for many these are just works of literature. For example, 'Luke draws parallels' is really short-hand for 'Parallels are seen by some in the Gospel of Luke' or 'The authors of the gospel of Luke attempt to draw parallels'. The first implies to non-Christian readers that Luke is a person who is actively drawing these parallels when that is not only a matter for debate (most of the gospels weren't written by single individuals), but sounds very strange to those of other faiths (or none at all). Read the later bits of the article with the mindset of a Hindu, Buddhist, or Atheist and many bits of it come across as assuming that these stories are somehow true, rather than works of literature from a different belief system. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jcummings (talk • contribs) 09:31, 25 December 2011 (UTC)