Template talk:Ahlalbayt

Neutrality

Ahl al-Bayt is a phrase and concept with significance to all Muslims. Hence, it shouldn't be Shia-centric in its presentation, misleadingly suggesting that Ahl al-Bayt is solely or primarily a Shia concept, which it really isn't. Can we fix this please? ITAQALLAH 23:53, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

While I personally adhere to the Shia perspective, I agree in this matter. I'll get to work now dividing the template into separate

And it pains me to say this because it is magnificent calligraphy, but the image is also only representative of the Shia point of view. If a more neutral image could be found that would be preferable. Peter Deer (talk) 08:23, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Originally, I had tried to put this without the Part of a series on Shi'a Islam and tried to just have Islam in there. It became almost painfully obvious that was not the case. What we may do is change the name rather than change the focus. The fact is the Shi'a and Sunni conception of Ahl al-Bayt are so utterly opposed to each other it would be ridiculous and self-defeating to have Ayesha in the same template as Husayn for many Shi'a. However, in order to respect the Sunni view, we would have to. So, I'll repeat, the solution to this issue isn't trying to combine two essentially different concepts, it should be coming up with a good name or a way of clearly saying that this represents the Shi'a point of view. I'll try to experiment a bit and we'll see what comes of it. --Enzuru 19:24, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I made some changes. Note that however, the sub-templates for the individuals, aside from the bottom portion, can be much more liberal in including multiple perspectives, in particular with Ali. --Enzuru 19:32, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Another thing that occured to me as the possibility that we would split the template into Sunni and Shi'a views. Here is somewhat of what I feel the issue with that is: there is a huge amount of people Sunni will consider Ahl al-Bayt, including the Wives of Muhammad which already has its own template. Combining them would I feel not be the best route to go. --Enzuru 19:36, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

A Sunni version

Tell me what you think, we need to add alot more still: Template:Ahlalbayt2 --Enzuru 19:56, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

The "view" thing seems a little shaky. Perhaps something more along the lines of "Sunni/Shia Theology" or something a little more...well, encyclopedic sounding. I think you're on to a good solution with providing separate ones. Also I like what you have going with the sunni one, a smaller version of the Shia one that would fit more with the nice compact size you have going seems like a good idea to me. Peter Deer (talk) 20:12, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I decided to go with Ahl al-Kisa instead of Ahl al-Bayt, so it makes a stronger distinction. --Enzuru 20:33, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

No problem, I've made it a tad smaller. --Enzuru 20:43, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I think that mention in the Ahl al-Kisa article should make mention of the connection with the Ahl al-Bayt concept and mentions in Hadith.

Thanks for your help on this, by the way, both of you. Peter Deer (talk) 21:38, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

And thank you for organizing this important project. The article now mentions Ahl al-Bayt. --Enzuru 22:16, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

A question I would ask is whether we need templates for this topic anyway... considering that the topic is very narrow in scope meaning there is little content of value that can be added to these templates. ITAQALLAH 23:59, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

In terms of Ahl al-Kisa (AS) and Ahl al-Bayt (AS) from the Shi'a perspective, I would argue that it is important to draw a theme between the five individuals, through the individual templates and a singular template, much like we are doing with the Twelve Imams. It's not much different than the Wives of Muhammad template, except we have sub-templates for each individual (like look at the Musa al-Kadhim page). --Enzuru 22:41, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

The potential is for a list of essentially four or five people, and then a series of links to unencyclopedic "Hadith of..." articles - which are all in fact unencyclopedic and should be deleted anyway. Most of them already have been deleted per community discussion and consensus (wherein a number of people noted that many of the articles existed as proxies for extended Shia v Sunni polemic, generally from a pro-Shia perspective) - any notable hadith should be discussed in the appropriate context and article, such as Succession to Muhammad. Similarly, a "Sunni view of Ahl al-bayt" template would simply include a small list of people which could easily be covered in one to two sentences of prose in the relevant article. ITAQALLAH 18:45, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I do not agree about the hadith issue, however I do understand that they easily become battlegrounds for polemics. Please see Sermon on the Mount (an event like a hadith, not a generality like the issue of succession or the teachings of Christ), Jesus wept (a single verse!), Finding in the Temple, and many others. I am not citing these as proof that these articles should not be deleted, but rather giving us a perspective where we as non-Christians can learn from these articles and find out how the respective events are viewed in Christianity and effect its scholarship and culture.

And what you're saying is much like stating we shouldn't have templates for Calvinism, because the points of Calvinism and its founders can be summed up in a paragraph. While I understand a list of individuals is somewhat different, it at least becomes powerful for easy navigation, like Template:WivesMuhammad or Template:Twelve Imams and its respective sub-templates. I would be suprised if you haven't used these templates, or templates like them, to navigate around sets of individuals yourself. --Enzuru 22:46, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

So we seem to agree that the state of articles or templates elsewhere on Wikipedia have no bearing on how we decide to organise content - that is decided by policy and guidelines. I don't agree that forking things out makes it any more encyclopedic. Articles should only be forked if there is substantial content available from multiple third party, reliable secondary sources. An endless series of "Hadith of..." articles (which is what we previously had), existing solely to forward an agenda, is not the way these topics should be covered. In certain cases it may be relevant to have an article about one passage or source, but only when it fulfills notability criteria. Your analogy with Sermon on the Mount is a bit off - it'd be the equivalent of an article on the Farewell Pilgrimage (in any case, there is a wealth of academic, non-trivial coverage available about this event). So too is your Calvinism analogy, it seems to be a well developed topic with plenty of sub-articles available. We're dealing here with a template about one aspect of a sub-topic- the amount of content we can include here is already highly minimalised - and it would probably be less if we were to delete redundant, unnecessary articles like Verse of purification and Hadith of Mubahala - these kinds of topics should be discussed within the context of the wider debate (i.e. Succession to Muhammad), they simply aren't notable enough for their own articles. ITAQALLAH 23:36, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

For now, I don't agree with two views of yours, and I'm going to get Seyyed to see what he thinks, but the two issues I disagree on are the following: 1) the purpose of templates 2) the notability of the articles on hand. Since Wikipedia does not use these resources for citatiosn anyway, and among other reasons, they have a depth that is all their own in regards to their nature. These hadith, very much like Jesus wept, should have their own articles. However, I agree on two issues as well: 1) These articles currently are shameless polemics 2) A few of them perhaps can be deleted, like don't we have a pointless one on mutah lying around? However, things like the Verse of Purificaton and Ghadir Khumm, and pretty much the ones that are linked to are ghastly important to the Shi'a tradition, and I would love if we can agree on their notability, to go through and create balanced articles. There is no question they should be Shi'a centric: the point of these articles is not debate, but viewing what they are to Shi'a, to our culture, to our faith system even if Sunnism did not exist. We teach our children these hadith, even outside of polemics: they are important to the religion of the Ahl al-Bayt. --Enzuru 04:54, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I'd rather we not cite other articles of questionable notability like Jesus wept. (cf. WP:OSE)

I feel you didn't understand my previous points, so I will explain one at a time. --Enzuru 21:07, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Notability is established by non-trivial, significant coverage in mutliple thirdy part reliable secondary sources. Many of these "hadith of" articles do not possess the kind of breadth and depth of academic coverage to warrant their own separate articles. Scholars may discuss then in a paragraph, within the context of their significance to the debate on ahl al-bayt, for example, but not independently.

That is not true, they are not only used for polemics. They are taught to our children, they are taught in our schools, and our text books see them as important. For the sake of comparison, it would be like teaching Sunni children about how after Moses came the lesser Israeli prophets, and then the new revelation of Christianity, and then finally Islam which abrogated and purified the previous faiths. This is an important idea, the idea of progressive revelation, and no Sunni child would not understand it. This isn't an idea we have just to tell Christians why we think the teachings of Christ have lesser importance, it's an idea that is central to the faith itself, even if Christianity no longer existed. Similiarly, if every Muslim was Shi'a, these articles would be important to, to explain how our faith continued after the death of the Prophet (AS). --Enzuru 21:07, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

You've lost me completely. Either a topic is notable enough for a Wikipedia article, or it isn't. If it's notable, prove it as stipulated in WP:N. If it doesn't fill that criteria, then it doesn't deserve its own article, and should be discussed under the relevant existing article. I don't see how your example is at all relevant. If you want to talk about Muslim history, do it in Muslim history. If you want to talk about the history of Shi'ism, do it in Shia Islam. But it doesn't justify a series of needless forks just to flesh out templates. I'm interested in depth of coverage and sourcing, which is fundamental in establishing notability. That is all. ITAQALLAH 22:52, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Per core content policy WP:NPOV, no article should unduly favour any opinion or perspective, especially if it reads like it's promotional of a doctrine or idealogy - which is what many of these pages are. That's what I mean by not making things Shia/Sunni/anything-centric. I think the Ghadir Khumm article should stay (for example), but the Hadith of Ghadir Khumm article should go, and any salvageable content should be condensed into a "History" section in the former.

No, but the fact is some unimportant events in one faith will be hugely important in another, and correct me if I'm wrong, but that does affect how an article should be written. Of course and obviously the Sunni perspective should make its way into an article, but that just ends up in the opposite of what we have now. Lines like "Sunnis vehemently deny that this was the appointment of a successor" will start making their way into the article. We have to show both sides of the story, but we cannot force a perspective that is almost essentially passive to the subject anyway. In fact, I think we should keep the Hadith of Ghadir Khumm and move Ghadir Khumm into it, instead of the other way around. --Enzuru 21:07, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Article content depends on the coverage allocated in academic reliable sources - not necessarily how we think it should be distributed. We should report about what different perspectives are in a balanced and neutral manner, and in a way that conforms to preventing undue weight. But I don't see how your comment lead you to conclude that an article about a place should be merged into an article about a narrative of a historical event. I see it as the other way around. The place is a valley, and has some history worth reporting. ITAQALLAH 22:45, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Similarly, the articles on Hadith of Umar's speech of forbidding Mut'ah and Hadiths regarding the legality of Nikah Mut'ah should go, and it should be the Mut'ah article which discusses any relevant sources. Same with the verse of purificationarticle, which is only significant in one specific context (i.e. ahl al-bayt) and thus it should be that article discussing it. Only when we have the weight in academic reliable sources should we produce content forks. In most cases regarding these 'hadith of' articles, we simply don't. ITAQALLAH 13:36, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I agreed already on the mutah articles, they are just polemics in regards to fiqh. But the verse of purification is important to Shi'a Islam outside polemics. It is a basis of the idea of Ahl al-Bayt, but it does deserve an article in and of itself because of even the varying interpretations in Shi'a Islam, for example, more mystical interpretations (Sufi) compared to more orthodox (Twelver) ones compared to Ismaili ones compared to Zaidi ones compared to a Sunni one. No, don't make it a debate, but show how this verse is a pillar in a different way for each branch of the Shi'a faith. For Sufis and Alevis, we can link to the idea of Insan i-Kamil, for Twelver link to the idea of Ismah, for Ismaili link to their article on Imamate, and for the Zaidi link to a page on Zaidi political thought. --Enzuru 21:07, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Sure, I agree in principle. But the big assumption is that we have this kind of depth available in the academic reliable sources. This doesn't mean trawling through tafsir works, because that would mean each of the 6,000+ verses of the Qur'an are notable from a WP perspective, which isn't really the case. If you can substantiate that the topic has received a significant volume of non-trivial coverage in academic reliable sources, then there's no reason why there shouldn't be an article. But that's my point, it is my opinion that no such coverage exists. ITAQALLAH 22:45, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I see what you're getting at, so the burden of proof lays upon me. I'll take care of it. --Enzuru 23:29, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

This is an old discussion which we've argued about frequently[1]. This issue lead to disagreement and I think we can't reach consensus over it. I told that it's good to make a guideline about it but I haven't had enough time for it.--Seyyed(t-c) 14:28, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

What kind of guideline exactly? What would it need to have? --Enzuru 23:30, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

We have a lot of problems with Hadith article as well as narrating Hadith in the body of the article. Please see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Hadith of the demise of Muhammad and Talk:Ahl al-Bayt.--Seyyed(t-c) 01:44, 11 June 2008 (UTC)