Talk:Inspiration of Ellen G. White

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Material moved from page[edit]

Recent material[edit]

Link removed from page:

Please justify why the individuals behind this site are notable enough to be included. Colin MacLaurin 19:15, 16 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Earlier material[edit]

Some of the basic points are helpful, but there is far too much information which is simply not relevant to the topic. Some of it might belong on other pages such as Victor Houteff. Please summarise it drastically. The material does not appear to abide by a neutral point of view.

The site www.gilead.net is linked to several times for the text of White's writings. The site is not a good choice, as it is not highly notable and also appears to represent the POV of Historic Adventism. Please link instead to the Ellen G. White Estate homepage, which is not only far more notable and more representative of mainstream Adventism, but is also the official Ellen White website. Colin MacLaurin 17:32, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The following section was moved from the article. As requested above, please summarise it drastically to a concise, encyclopedic style. Most of the detail is not relevant to this article, but pertinent shorter remarks could fit it well. It appears to represent a critical POV, whereas Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy states that all major viewpoints be represented. Colin MacLaurin 07:05, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Section mergers with Ellen White[edit]

This page is about the nature of the inspiration of Ellen White and her writings. This is a much more specific topic than the general page Ellen White, but this is the particular point controverted. Two reasons for this page:

  1. There is a lot of material for this page
  2. This is the controverted point regarding her. Her existence, her life etc. are not disputed. But her writings/inspiration is what is disputed. Many articles and sections support or dispute her prophetic gift specifically. The existence of this page allows a natural wikilink to be created from these other articles. However a wikilink to the Ellen White page would be off topic. Again, this page would go in the Category:Seventh-day Adventist theology, because it describes a theological belief of the church. But the Ellen White page would not belong in this category. A related concept is the "Spirit of prophecy".

The main page would be left to describe her biography, family life, leadership influence upon the church, role in the 1888 meeting, and even a list of her writings and the major themes within. Colin MacLaurin 10:34, 19 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am not sure about the theology category link. I can't quite think of why but I see this page as separate from a discussion of the churches theology.
Apart from that, this page is valid according to the comments I made earlier about it. NPOV can easily hold under the title as is. The title does not stop evidence against the gift from being presented so it is not a POV fork. Ansell 12:25, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

I disagree that any person should get two entries, and if you must keep them seperate, than I would say move this to Ellen White : The Prophetic Gift or something like that. It is almost like you are advertising for her by putting it under prophecy Mattbman 22:43, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Actually many people described in Wikipedia have several articles. Consider William Shakespeare for instance. There is a lot of content for Ellen G. White, and in fact the debate as to whether or not her prophetic gift was genuine is the most contentious issue regarding her. An article name change could be justified, but other articles on George W. Bush also use this style - Early life of George W. Bush and Professional life of George W. Bush. One policy stated, "Do not use an article name that suggests a hierarchy of articles". The policy Wikipedia:Summary style is relevant to this discussion. Colin MacLaurin 16:41, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Title[edit]

What is the best title for this article? Some have suggested it is currently POV, which is certainly not intended. As pointed out by anothers, article titles such as Papal infallibility could also sound POV. "Prophetic gift of Ellen White" is a little clumsy. How about a rename to Inspiration of Ellen White (which currently redirects here), which is a slightly less specific title, and shorter? The word "inspiration" could have a spiritual connotation to a religious person and/or supporter of White, or the entirely humanistic connotation of "creativity" to a critic. Another option would be to merge it into Spirit of Prophecy (Adventist), however I strongly disagree with this, as many Adventists themselves criticise the use of this term. Colin MacLaurin 05:11, 15 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Support. The proposed title is far more neutral. The current title assumes she had a prophetic gift, which may be contentious to some. MyNameIsNotBob 10:18, 19 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. -- Fyslee/talk 08:32, 7 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Done. Thanks for the input. I am hoping for more editorial attention to this page. Cheers, Colin MacLaurin 12:36, 7 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Move[edit]

Was there any discussion of the move from Inspiration of Ellen White to Inspiration of Ellen G. White before it happened? That name change was not indisputable, and should have been discussed first. Colin MacLaurin (talk) 11:26, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I now agree with the change, because the Adventist News Network Glossary recommends White's name be written "Ellen G. White". Please discuss debateable changes like this in future, and at least give a reason for the change. Colin MacLaurin (talk) 00:45, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Reply to Additions[edit]

If I might direct your attention to the title of this page, which have somehow escaped your consideration.

  • The Prophetic Gift of Ellen White.

This page, was therefore devoted history of Mrs. White’s “gift,” and I have striven to create a balance perspective of same, with strong historical overtones. Should one wish to seriously evaluate Mrs. White’s “Prophetic Gift,” in the context of a Wikipedia article, then he must certainly create a balanced portrayal of the history of this “Prophetic gift,” which Mrs. White claimed to possess. Perhaps you, as an Adventist, were incapable of writing a disinterested account of Mrs. White’s “prophetic gift;” previous to my editing of this article, I noticed that it was meandering, overburdened with excessive references to redundant and frequently unknown sources. Your summation of the intrinsic differences between Mrs. Whites partisans and enemies left a great deal to be desired, as well. If the quotations which I used in substantiation of my case are accurate, then I see no reason to alter the references to them. Might I further remind you that Wikipedia is largely patronized by users who are non-Adventists, and therefore the use of accepted Adventist sources is superfluous. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Luciuscrassus (talk • contribs) 13:14, 31 March 2007 (UTC).[reply]

Regarding the title, please see my above earlier comment under the section "Title". If you have a recommendation, please supply it. I request that you show me the benefit of the doubt per the assume good faith policy. In my edits I have attempted to give a balanced portrayal. In particular, I have mentioned many critics and linked to their online books, if available. What could have more detail is specific reasons critics give to doubt White's inspiration. Perhaps you could contribute here. I disagree that the sources I have cited are "redundant and frequently unknown" - this could perhaps be argued for a couple but the majority are highly prominent. Regarding your last comment, Wikipedia's NPOV policy is that all major viewpoints be presented. One such major viewpoint is that of critics, one is that of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in this case (both nuanced viewpoints themselves). For the Adventist POV, of course references will be from Adventist sources. Colin MacLaurin 14:57, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"Mainstream" Adventst Scholars[edit]

I added a "citation needed for the following, but I believe that is not sufficient. This section needs to be re-worked. As the article already states, there is a diversity of views about EGW's inspiration among SDAs - including among scholars. Who are the "mainstream" scholars, who made the judgement they were mainstream, and what criteria were used? I think this section should be deleted until it can be presented in more careful detail, but I will simply make that suggestion for now and see what others think.

"Typical mainstream Adventist scholars today believe [citation needed]:

  • she was inspired by God... yet she was not infallible (without error)
  • her writings are important to and relevant to the Adventist church today... yet must not form the basis for doctrine
  • her writings are inferior to the Bible and non-canonical... yet superior to ordinary Christian literature
  • she was culturally conditioned to some degree... yet she was not limited to the culture of her day only, but transcended it to some degree
  • she borrowed from other authors... yet was not without discrimination in her inspired usage"

Gogh 02:04, 21 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Many of the applicable references can be found on the rest of the page. See WP:LEAD for what a lead section is all about. In general the lead section is a condensed version of the rest of the page, so if the citations appear in the body then it is sufficient. If you want to copy references so that they appear in both places then feel free, but as such I do not think the statements are totally unfounded. Ansell 23:53, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
I do not see the many applicable references later in the page that you suggest should be there. I do see summaries of various positions, but for the most part I do not see substantiation for categorizing some positions as , for example "mainstream". I think you are in danger here of creating more of a theological article than an encycclopedic article. I think you are better off summarizin what the official church documents say on this subject, and then indicating - briefly - what the range of views within the church might be. If you are going to go into the fine distinctions, and describe some as mainstream or majority, then you better find some pretty good support for these claims.Gogh 07:44, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Bot report : Found duplicate references ![edit]

In the last revision I edited, I found duplicate named references, i.e. references sharing the same name, but not having the same content. Please check them, as I am not able to fix them automatically :)

  • "Samples" :
    • [[Kenneth Samples|Samples, Kenneth]] (2007). "[http://qod.andrews.edu/docs/08_kenneth_samples.pdf Evangelical Reflections on Seventh-day Adventism: Yesterday and Today]". [[Questions on Doctrine#50th anniversary conference|''Questions on Doctrine'' 50th anniversary conference]]
    • {{cite journal | last = Samples | first = Kenneth R. | authorlink = | title = From Controversy to Crisis: An Updated Assessment of Seventh-day Adventism | journal = Christian Research Journal | volume = 11 | issue = 1 | pages = 9–? | publisher = [[Christian Research Institute]] | location = [[San Juan Capistrano, California|San Juan Capistrano]], [[California|CA]] | issn = 1082-572X | date = Summer 1988 | url = http://www.iclnet.org/pub/resources/text/cri/cri-jrnl/web/crj0005b.html | doi = | id = | accessdate = 2007-11-21 }}

DumZiBoT (talk) 09:46, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Talk merged from Adventist studies[edit]

The following comments were merged here from Adventist studies, as this article and Progressive Adventism received the biggest chunks of the merge. My best guess for a redirect target was, however, List of Seventh-day Adventist colleges and universities. JJB 05:47, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

Graybill[edit]

Why does this page redirect from Ronald Graybill for no apparent reason? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 165.145.83.137 (talk) 10:02, 17 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You will notice that Ronald Graybill redirects to the section "Ellen White studies" of this article. He was a prominent scholar in this field. The redirect is a "redirect with possibilities", which means it is "possible" he will have or deserves his own article sometime in the future. For now, some barebones details and references are provided here. If two people have the same name, a disambiguation page or a disambiguation link will be needed. Colin MacLaurin (talk) 02:31, 19 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I do agree it was unclear. I have made a subsection just for him, with a view to expanding this at some point. An equivalent option would be to place him on the Ellen G. White Estate article. Colin MacLaurin (talk) 03:34, 27 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Merge and delete[edit]

Since a heavy chunk is already slated for merge, my first impression of the article is that the entire item and talk should be merged and deleted. Targets: Inspiration of Ellen White (main and talk catchall), Progressive Adventism#University controversies, and Avondale College. Very little beyond those 3 topics indicates any AfD notability. Not bothering with additional templates because of little traffic. JJB 18:26, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

John, I am ok with you merging the rest if you desire. A lot of the links were broken in the references (every spectrum link i checked) and I have recently removed them. Some statements seemed a little slanted as well. I agree with all your points. Thanks for your help in this matter. P.S. I would wait a few days to see if anyone disagrees with my statements or edits before wiping this article. Willfults (talk) 15:19, 24 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

needs some rewriting[edit]

This is too wordy. I'll be seeing what I can do from time to time. CedricElijahHenry (talk) 06:04, 29 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Assessment comment[edit]

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Inspiration of Ellen G. White/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

Comment(s)Press [show] to view →
== 1. This article is redundant as there is already an article about EGW.

2. This article is not accurate nor balanced as it attempts to label Progressive(Liberal) Adventist opinions towards EGW as being that of mainstream adventism.

3. It also is weighted heavily with articles and references and links to detractors and critics and equivalent counterbalancing is not present.

The Author of this particular piece is a self-identified "Progressive Adventist."

That aforementiond established factoid could easily been deduced by reading this piece - without investigating the user profile. == —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 162.66.50.3 (talk • contribs) 19:26, 27 February 2007 (UTC) (UTC), also IP 162.66.50.4[reply]

In regards to point 1, the debate concerning White's prophetic gift is actually the most notable part of her life - e.g. noone argues about details of her life such as whether or not she died in 1915! Regarding point 2, I invite all authors to contribute towards the neutrality of the article. If you claim my own POV has affected me, please note that most of the descriptions of the critics and critical links were added by me, despite the fact that this is not my POV. I have tried to feature Douglass' book prominently, as IMO this is the closest to an "official" book regarding White as a prophet. If there is more detail given to progressive authors this reflects my own personal knowledge base, not a deliberate bias. Please contribute more details about "mainstream" authors (as you see them), as you probably know more about them than I do! Regards, Colin MacLaurin 05:02, 9 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Last edited at 01:47, 1 January 2012 (UTC). Substituted at 18:58, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

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Plagiarism[edit]

She entered a guilty plea. Afterwards Ramik, the lawyer employed by the SDA, cleared her of breaking the law (but not of plagiarism in the academic sense). Essential is that she confessed. She was innocent juridically, but she plagiarized in the academic sense. Tgeorgescu (talk) 06:08, 8 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@78.26: Ok, I have rephrased. McArthur does say it's a commonplace, nothing controversial, even SDA publishing houses have admitted it and offer footnotes to the works she copied from. Tgeorgescu (talk) 13:55, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That still has the same problem. "Well-informed" is loaded, as is "naive thesis of plenary inspiration" That is most definitely a personal interpretation, and isn't found anywhere in the source. I'm disappointed. 78.26 (spin me / revolutions) 14:00, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@78.26: "Educated" is found in the source, so the first time I got it right (whether you like it or not):

But liberal scholarship prevailed in one arena: it permanently revised our understanding of Ellen White's historical writings. For decades, a type of verbal inspiration dominated popular Adventism, shaping the church culture to a degree that today's generation of Adventist youth could hardly imagine. Within at least the educated mainstream church, that is no longer the case. Discussions proceed about historical and theological issues less encumbered by appeals to discussion-ending Red Book quotations. This matters because American Adventism now stands poised at what appears to be a new age of dialogue, driven by a sense of urgency about revitalizing the North American Church.

— McArthur, op.cit.
Full quotation from its first page is:

If acceptance of her literary borrowing is now a commonplace, it is only so because of some excellent research accomplished by Adventist scholars in the 1970s and 1980s. Their conclusions need no retelling here. Suffice it to say, we have learned that inspiration is more complex and more subject to human elements than our naive, earlier view held.'

— Ibidem
So, of course "naive thesis of plenary inspiration" is a paraphrase of the leitmotif of the paper: 100% verbal inspiration of EGW vs. creative copy/pasting. Hint: US SDA publishing houses quietly acknowledged the later. Another quote:

Indeed, virtually none of its history came from visions, but instead from earlier historians. The inspired passages were limited to descriptions of supernatural activities of Christ and Satan.

— Ibidem
Also if the Ramik quote with "conclusively unplagiaristic" is supposed to pull the wool upon our eyes, that is a WP:NPOV violation. Why would a lawyer write a report upon literary property rights according to the law of the land and time if he only has to deal with plagiarism in an academic sense? That makes no sense. He cleared her juridically, not academically. She is still guilty of creative copy/paste, academically speaking. And the fact that her own admission of guilt follows that specific quote from Ramik's report is proper to the theater of the absurd, not of a serious secular encyclopedia. Think of this dialogue, Judge: "The verdict: the jury unanimously finds you not guilty." Suspect: "Your honor, I did murder Mr. Smith!" Facepalm. As for Richard W. Schwarz, "Professor, I did not plagiarize my paper, but I was supernaturally inspired in more or less the same words as someone else." Would any reputable university accept that argument against the verdict of the plagiarism scanner? That's why I think that Schwarz's argument sounds like something from the Looney Tunes. Are we supposed to WP:GEVAL to the historical method and Looney Tunes? Schwarz's argument has no historical value, and the worst part is that he knew that since he wrote it down. Contrary to what you might think, I don't have an axe to grind, I want nothing but the facts. Tgeorgescu (talk) 18:58, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

White did not have a "formal" education beyond the 3rd grade or so, however she became self-educated, like many in her day, through being widely read. She had a large library. She wrote some 50,000 pages of manuscript in her own hand writing; Hundreds of magazine articles; hundreds of letters; and several dozen books. She was a renown orator in great demand, who spoke to thousands and thousands of people through out the US, Australia and Europe. She sounded like she knew what she was talking about because she did. In her later life, some believers accredited everything she wrote as coming directly from the mouth of God. In her early carrier, no one who knew her ever claimed such nonsense because they knew better. White never made any such claim or intimation. It was to dispel such silly notions that she wrote about her sources in the forward to the 1911 Great Controversy jshortly before her death. However, that claim that everything she wrote came directly from the mouth of God remained an urban legend in the SDA community and grew exponentially after her death in 1915, which is why Ray was so shocked when he discovered that it wasn't so. And why Numbers is so viciously anti White. Yes, she used other sources, just like everybody else. And like most in her day, those sources were not always noted. but her use was not for her gain or self aggrandizement. She was looking for the best ways to express what she believed that God had impressed upon her mind. She was not a mindless dictation machine. She claimed that she was shown things in vision and then she told or wrote down what she had seen and heard. Since her death, the White estate has gone to great lengths to add footnotes to her republished works giving credit to sources where known. Contrary to the claims of Ray and other critics, most of what White wrote is enough different from her sources to not constitute cut and past copyright plagiarism. It is important to note that her statement in 1911 occurred long before charges of plagiarism ever came up so I'm adding that back in. Back in her day, there were plenty of critics, but none ever charged plagiarism. Plagiarism is a distinctly mid-20th century concern. --DebbieEdwards (talk) 21:17, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
That is a quote from someone who does believe in EGW's inspiration, albeit not naively. So, the cause of all that rage and bitterness was an urban legend, which is now debunked. So, yes, as McArthur stated, "at least the educated mainstream church" (SDA) have acknowledged that the myth was busted and have revised their views accordingly. Everyone except Kool Aid drinkers has accepted that the myth was busted. This is an objective fact. Wikipedia is biased for objective facts. So my take does not violate WP:NPOV. A bias for the objective reality isn't a sinister cabal, see WP:GOODBIAS. The NPOV view (agreed by the secular academia, liberal and moderate Adventists) is that the myth is stubborn and has done a lot of damage to the SDA church. Wikipedia has to render that some are right and some are wrong on this matter and that far-fetched, objectively seen ridiculous explanations are not the way wherein conservative Adventists could save face. Schwarz's argument is far-fetched and ridiculous, and he should have known better. Unwillingly, he gave his students a perfect example of what to avoid like the pest in a scholarly paper: "Hey, if you want to pass your exam in any bona fide faculty don't do like me!" Tgeorgescu (talk) 07:08, 2 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I've struck through a post by another of Allenroyboy's socks. Doug Weller talk 09:35, 2 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't research why he got indeffed, but I don't think that he was lying like a dog in the above post. Tgeorgescu (talk) 09:49, 2 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe not, but Allenroyboy is not entitled to edit and attempts need to be discouraged. Doug Weller talk 10:54, 2 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, nothing to do with lying... I had no idea that quotes would also get stricken but it makes sense for scrutiny, —PaleoNeonate – 18:25, 2 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

NPOV missing[edit]

This article is written apologetically and is promotional of White. Wikipedia articles must be written from a Neutral Point of View. NewBluePencil (talk) 03:37, 2 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, I did not quote Schwartz because I would believe what he stated, but because his point of view is so ridiculous that even bona fide Adventists who studied history at an university will admit that it is completely ridiculous, and that it betrays his desperation to deny objective facts in favor of theological dogma (ideology vs. reality conflict). tgeorgescu (talk) 06:56, 2 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Renomination for deletion[edit]

As an Adventist religious studies scholar with a PhD (Chicago) in biblical studies, I highly recommend that this article be deleted as completely inappropriate for a general, user-generated encyclopedia like Wikipedia. It is an unabashedly apologetic piece that is certainly more suited for a denominational publication or some kind of SDA evangelistic document. As if this were not enough, the published page includes a very significant, two-fold set of technical problems with the article that Wiki editors identified in 2013 as follows:

This section is written like a personal reflection, personal essay, or argumentative essay that states a Wikipedia editor's personal feelings or presents an original argument about a topic. Please help improve it by rewriting it in an encyclopedic style. (December 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

This section possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed. (December 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

This technical problem is noted six times in the article! In my opinion, this "Inspiration" article would never be approved if submitted today (nor should it be) not only because of its inappropriate content but also for its serious technical problems. How the editors have let this slip for nine years is beyond me.

If it is deemed necessary to mention "inspiration" with reference to EGW (which I don't), a sentence identifying this as the position of "many" Adventist could be added to the main bio article. Wctrenchard (talk) 02:11, 13 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Point about WP:OR granted. But prod is not the way. You may submit a formal deletion request if you want. tgeorgescu (talk) 01:12, 4 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for replying. I assumed that the PROD would not work, given that it had been tried before, but my little essay didn't work either or even garner a reply until now. Nevertheless, I really want this article deleted for the stated reasons. How do I "submit a formal deletion request"?Wctrenchard (talk) 06:39, 4 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Wctrenchard: I submitted it for discussion, noting that I don't agree with you. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Inspiration of Ellen G. White. tgeorgescu (talk) 06:57, 4 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: As the main original author of this article, I am disappointed that plenty of good material (IMO) has been removed. For example the text "Approximately 81% of Adventists believe `The writings of Ellen White are an authority for the Adventist Church today', according to estimates made by local church leaders of their congregations, in a 2002 worldwide survey." (For the citation, search for the text "19%" in older versions of the article.) That is valuable sociological information. Also Ronald Numbers' book deserves more coverage again; he later became a leading authority on the history of science and religion. Personally at least, I miss the references to Clark Pinnock, a well-known theologian; even if his comments were somewhat incidental, non-Adventist POVs on this topic are less common. I could go on. Colin MacLaurin (talk) 05:43, 30 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Colin MacLaurin: I have removed stuff with too much WP:OR. If it gets WP:CITED, then I have nothing against it. tgeorgescu (talk) 05:54, 30 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Tgeorgescu:, I think my comments refer to quite a few years ago. I recall there were editors who added (way too many) block quotations of primary source material, particularly of White herself, while blanking good material. Often others removed this added text, but did not restore the blanked material. (By the way, my comment was not intended for you nor Wctrenchard specifically, but as a general comment on the deletion discussion, which is now archived.) Colin MacLaurin (talk) 06:21, 30 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Colin MacLaurin: Yup, saw it at https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Inspiration_of_Ellen_G._White&type=revision&diff=1098712858&oldid=373974540&diffmode=source . However, that is very much an WP:IN-UNIVERSE view, with too few mainstream WP:RS, and I mean both defenders and opponents or Mrs. White are often published in non-mainstream outlets. tgeorgescu (talk) 07:05, 30 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
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