Talk:Jehovah's Witnesses and salvation

This text was taken from Doctrines of Jehovah's Witnesses, which is a long article that needs to be kept shorter. If the article is in some way unencyclopedic, I request a discussion of how to change it. Summer Song 16:25, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

As the user who tagged this article for deletion, I recommend that if the main article needs to be shortened, convert this one to a subpage of same. I will leave a modified tag on this article until such time. --HubHikari 17:32, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I removed the PROD tag. That is not the appropriate tag if cleanup is needed. This is a subpage of Doctrines of Jehovah's Witnesses which is itself a sub-page of Jehovah's Witnesses. If you feel the article needs editing, please use a specific tag from Wikipedia:Cleanup resources, not a prod tag which will lead to the article's deletion. GRBerry 02:27, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Trying to clarify doctrine

I went ahead and made edits that I felt were not harmful to the article. I added refs and tried to make the language more in line with them. Revert if it is felt necessary. --Brotherlawrence (talk) 22:22, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Merger proposal

Merge proposal discussed and withdrawn.

This article currently relies almost completely on The Watchtower and other Jehovah's Witness publications for references. This is a violation of the third-party requirements of the reliable sources policy. With all unacceptable sources removed, the article would be reduced to stub status and should be moved back to the parent article until sufficient research for a split is complete. --Explodicle (talk) 19:01, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

• Note: I was confusing "first-party, second-party, third-party" with "primary, secondary, and tertiary" sources, and we'd actuatlly want secondary, not tertiary sources anyways. --Explodicle (talk) 20:12, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

• After looking at it again, I don't see any non-JW sources. Since I haven't gotten any responses here I propose deletion. --Explodicle (talk) 19:07, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Though it may not be quite in line with the reliable sources guideline (not "policy"), the topic is one which is intrinsically going to have primarily JW sources for their own hypothetical religious beliefs about salvation, just as any other religious doctrine specific to a certain religion. The article on Beatification only has Catholic sources. Does this mean that article should be deleted? The reason this article is not merged with the 'Beliefs and Practices article' is because that article will become too lengthy.--Jeffro77 (talk) 01:35, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Oops! I was wrong to list as a PROD (since it was already listed once) and also wrong to think WP:RS was a policy. However, WP:V is a policy, and it states: "If no reliable, third-party sources can be found for an article topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it." --Explodicle (talk) 21:21, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Ok, now that the AfD has decided to keep without any prejudice to the merger proposal, are there any objections? --Explodicle (talk) 02:42, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

As stated during the AfD discussion, I believe the article is well referenced by sources that are reliable in their own right. There's enough information for a stand alone article and merging it with Beliefs and practices of Jehovah's Witnesses would make for too long of an article. SWik78 (talk • contribs) 17:51, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

My concern is that by basing the article primarily on JW sources, we are giving undue weight towards the Jehovah's Witness POV. This article shouldn't just list what they believe, but also include the reactions of others to these beliefs and the impact all this has made on the rest of the world. I think we've got two potential paths:

1. Leave the article here, keeping the Witness perspective clear while elaborating on others, or
2. Merge into the parent article, get it neutral, and then expand out as an essentially rewritten version.

Ultimately both will result in a neutral and comprehensive article, but either will take a long time and will be difficult. Since neutrality is one of the five pillars that defines the character of Wikipedia, I think it should come first - our primary focus. --Explodicle (talk) 19:57, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Why would the article have to be merged in order to make it more neutral and then separate it again? Why can't it be "neutralized" right here, without 2 moves? SWik78 (talk • contribs) 20:01, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Don't get me wrong, that's possible; I've seen neutral articles come out of biased ones before. I've had a tough time finding reliable secondary sources for this subject, so if it were left up to me it would be more neutral but very short (and thus better to merge). If you can neutralize what we've got here, I'd be happy with that too. --Explodicle (talk) 20:47, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Based on the consensus reached due to discussion at Talk:Beliefs and practices of Jehovah's Witnesses, I am withdrawing the merge proposal. --Explodicle (talk) 14:11, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Paradise earth

JW publications typically use the term "paradise earth" rather than "paradisaic earth" or "paradisiac earth".
Should encyclopedic references to JW beliefs use the perfectly grammatical term used overwhelmingly in JW literature, or should encyclopedic references inject one of the two latter terms?
JWs would likely note that parts of the earth are already "paradisaic", that is, "like paradise". Additionally, IMHO, "paradisaic" reminds me of the snack foods at the convenience store labeled "choclaty cake" rather than "chocolate cake"; one wonders if there is any actual "chocolate" in the "choclaty cake". Why fudge the matter? --AuthorityTam (talk) 21:22, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

No. Paradise does not normally function as an adjective. Paradisaic is favourable over paradisiac (which is incorrectly influenced by the word 'aphrodisiac'). Rewording in forms such as 'earth will be a paradise' are also acceptable. Your own relative unfamiliarity with the word "paradisaic", demonstrated by your comparison to 'choclaty', does not invalidate the correctness of the word in favour of JW jargon.--Jeffro77 (talk) 01:11, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

"...relative unfamiliarity with the word "paradisaic"..."? That's not nice.
I'd have thought my analogy to be obvious, but I'll now make it painfully obvious...
The word "paradise" is a noun, just as "chocolate" is a noun (in my example, a specific ingredient which the FDA defines).
The word "paradisaic" is an adjective which means "like paradise", just as "choclaty" (excuse the typo) is an adjective which means "like chocolate".
If I may... is User:Jeffro77 actually arguing that "paradise earth" is an incorrect use of the word "paradise"?
--AuthorityTam (talk) 12:55, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Your comparison of the noun "paradise" with the adjective/trademark "choclaty" suggests that you don't understand the correct usage of the word paradise. If you don't understand, then my statement is not "not nice" at all, and if you do understand, then your statement about choclaty is irrelevant. I am therefore stating, quite plainly, that JWs use the term "paradise earth" in a jargonistic fashion (indeed as you said, "overwhelmingly"). I am also stating that paradise is not an adjective, and that "paradisaic" is an adjective that means not only "like paradise" but "of, relating to or like paradise". The statement "paradise earth" is probably fine in informal or poetic usage, but it is indeed not strictly correct, and there is no reason to defer to that wording unless quoting an original source.--Jeffro77 (talk) 14:44, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

It would be better to park the condescension elsewhere. It's unproductive.
Actually... I compared "chocolaty" with "paradisaic"; both are adjectives.
Also, I compared "chocolate" with "paradise"; both are nouns but also both reflect the key quality of the noun which they precede.
I'll note that I don't recall insisting that "paradise" is an adjective. --AuthorityTam (talk) 22:02, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Evidently, your confusion stems from your mistaken idea that "chocolate" (in the expression "chocolate cake") is a noun, whereas in such usage it is an adjective. Paradise doesn't function as an adjective in this manner, as you will find if you consult a dictionary.--Jeffro77 (talk) 10:04, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Please, let's drop the insistences
* that I'm 'unfamiliar with paradisaic',
* that I "don't understand the correct usage of the word paradise",
* that I suffer from "confusion", and
* that I harbor a 'mistaken idea that chocolate is a noun'. Please.
Really, any ingredient (or rather, any noun) could be juxtaposed with "cake". Readers are likely familiar with carrot cake, pound cake, cheese cake, angel cake, etc.
Similarly, it's silly to pretend that a particular noun cannot be grammatically juxtaposed with "planet". It seems unsurprising to imagine a writer referring to, for example, a "jungle planet", a "desert planet", a "water planet", a "carbon planet", a "gas planet", an "ocean planet", a "treasure planet", etc.
It seems odd to pretend some grammatical disqualification for "paradise planet" (or, more to the point, "paradise earth").
Do editor objections to the term "paradise earth" really reflect an evenhanded application of English grammar?
Googlebooks lists over 600 books which use the term "paradise earth", including several encyclopedias discussing but not explicitly quoting Jehovah's Witnesses. If an editor here has an argument he believes outweighs the preponderance of scholarly examples, that editor should present his argument soon. --AuthorityTam (talk) 13:39, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Seems to me that a fair number of those 600 books are either Watch Tower publications or books quoting them. Many more do not include that phrase; the list includes books with the two words separated by commas or full points. LTSally (talk) 13:46, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

The alleged support from the Google Books search is indeed unreliable. Many are quotes from JW literature. Most are instances separated by punctuation. Over 100 are repeated quotes of a poetic "Fruits of more than paradise; Earth by angel feet be trod". Many are repeated titles, such as "EARTH A PARADISE Earth a paradise". Others are entirely different grammatical structures, such as "What a paradise Earth is!"--Jeffro77 (talk) 02:26, 22 August 2009 (UTC)