Talk:Paul Reuter

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rankly, this page is a mess. Needs a major rewrite. 194.125.41.40 01:09, 17 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

i suggest taking the phrase "jewish" out of the article as Reuter was not very religious, as far as i know. It should at least be moved further down as a side note and not as an atribute of nationality!

Agree - I am not aware of any biographies making a point of his religion. He and his family were buried in consecrated ground so I very much doubt that he was a practising Jew at death! Mention of his religion as part of the body of the article, or in those various categories, is at best irrelevant or worst misleading, unless someone can produce good evidence. Ephebi 18:11, 30 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You are probably not aware that Judaism is the religion, and being born to a Jewish family makes you Jewish because its an ethnicity, nor matter how much the religion is part of your life. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.5.4.40 (talk) 20:50, 17 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I understand your point about ethnicity, but I also refer you to Who is a Jew? - "the Jewish identity shares some of the characteristics of an ethnicity and a religion, the definitions of a Jew may vary". According to that article Reuter would not count as Jewish for the purposes of the current Israeli citizenship laws. Reuter was a Christian convert and was buried in Christian consecrated ground (and a very fine brown granite monument it is too). In other words, he had turned his back on Judaism. In fact he converted to Christianity almost immediately he set foot in England, so would that make him a member of both [German Jews] and [British Christians] !? WP policies are that we do not add categories that are non-defining. So until we can show evidence that his father's ethnicity or religion defined some part of his adult life or business then the [--- Jews] category is inappropriate. Ephebi (talk) 09:25, 18 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have got an idea, if you say he converted after immigrating to the UK, than it means that as a German he was Jewish, but as a Brit he wasn't, meaning i think that if you can source it(that he converted to christianity) than you should list him out of "British Jews" , but he should remain in "German Jews".By the way, the same story was more or less with Karl Marx, meaning being born German-Jewish, but then living in the UK as a christian convert. User:81.5.4.40

thanks for the reference to Marx's article - it certainly illustrates the problem in classification. Marx's discussion page is also quite interesting, if lengthy & somewhat heated at times. It raises some criteria to consider for categorising which I think worthy of highlighting:

1 whether his being of Jewish origin (which may be, but is not necessarily the same thing as, an ethnic Jew) is relevant to the article.

2 Whether we have verifiable sources that indicate he identified himself as a Jew

3 Whether he was "German" (Kassel-Hesse was annexed by Prussia in 1866, the Deutsches Reich wasn't founded until 1871)

(We could also pose the same questions 1 & 2 about his Christianity) I don't think we can easily say "yes" to any of the above, and so I would say we should drop all references to his religious background in this case, and just leave the descriptin in the body of the article's text. However, I also note that, regardless, Marx is currently classified - amongst others - under: German-English people | German Jews | Jewish atheists (!) | Converts from Judaism to Christianitywhile the debate rages. Ephebi (talk) 16:41, 19 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well by their ethnicity they might have both been Jewish, but nevermind about that. It seems that Marx's article is semi protected, so their is nothing we can do about it, but in my opinion some of the categories you have mentioned he should be listed in them and in some not. Anyway back to Paul Reuter, the references certianly do suggest that at first he was Jewish by both ethnicity and religion and in the UK he converted, so what categories are relevant? in my opinion at least the "German-Jews" one,the German ones(about your comments above, we call "German" to all people from the german countries in all times, even before otto pon bissmark and the first reich in 1871 ), and of course the British ones. "British-Jews"? if on this one you say we should remove it, i might agree with you.