Talk:Shaolin Monastery

message: Could we at least open a discussion here as to why "Shao-lin Ssu" cannot be included in the transliteration? You are making a mere point of view if you think people only say it as "si". In the dialect they speak up there, where it counts, it is pronounced "Ssu". The "si" you mention is Cantonese speech--and by the way, if you choose to transliterate with "si" you must also put "Siu-lum", which is the way those dialects pronounce it. Otherwise you are simply putting a wrong transliteration.
Also, could the editor interefering with grammatical improvements make a better argument than "it was OK as it was"?76.195.82.230 (talk) 19:33, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You are confusing pronunciation with orthography, and your edit was reverted because you incorrectly claimed "ssu" to be pinyin and altered the valid pinyin romanization. Also, take care not to mix Cantonese and Mandarin together as you did with the Cantonese addition,. Ergative rlt (talk) 22:10, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm afraid Ergative is correct. Please see this dictionary entry. Notice the provided Cantonese equivalents in the right hand corner. Ssu is the older Wade-Giles representation of sì, which is Pinyin. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 23:13, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Shao-lin Ssu 

message: Could we at least open a discussion here as to why "Shao-lin Ssu" cannot be included in the transliteration? You are making a mere point of view if you think people only say it as "si". In the dialect they speak up there, where it counts, it is pronounced "Ssu". The "si" you mention is Cantonese speech--and by the way, if you choose to transliterate with "si" you must also put "Siu-lum", which is the way those dialects pronounce it. Otherwise you are simply putting a wrong transliteration.
Also, could the editor interefering with grammatical improvements make a better argument than "it was OK as it was"?76.195.82.230 (talk) 19:33, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You are confusing pronunciation with orthography, and your edit was reverted because you incorrectly claimed "ssu" to be pinyin and altered the valid pinyin romanization. Also, take care not to mix Cantonese and Mandarin together as you did with the Cantonese addition,. Ergative rlt (talk) 22:10, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm afraid Ergative is correct. Please see this dictionary entry. Notice the provided Cantonese equivalents in the right hand corner. Ssu is the older Wade-Giles representation of sì, which is Pinyin. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 23:13, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Shao-lin Ssu 

message: "During the Tang Dynasty, Emperor Taizong granted the Shaolin Temple extra land and special "imperial dispensation" to eat meat and drink, making Shaolin the only Buddhist temple in China that's not dry, although this practice is ceased today.[12]"
Professor Shahar does not corroborate the above paragraph, in page 46 of The Shaolin Monastery History, Religion and The Martial Arts one can read: "...it is hard to know weather this novel approach to carnivorousness preceded the movie or originated with it". Also in the Shaolin Monatery Stele on Mount Song by Tonami Mamoru, there is not mentioned of Li Shimin granting permission to eat meat; the rewards as translated by Mamoru are: "forty qing of lands and one watermill" pages 17-18, 35. Not every book out there is a reliable source, I sugest to remove or modify the paragraph. 
(talk) 21:51, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Meat Eating

message: Abbot Shi Yongxin has no clearly cited or sourced list of ancestry, therefore I have removed the name of the Shao-lin abbot who preceded him. In fact there is no clear statement about who served as abbot before Shi Yongxin Fojia. I myself have seen at least three "Shao-lin abbots" AT THE SAME TIME, all immediately preceding Shi Yongxin Fojia.
Because of the Communist iron grip in China, I do not trust any lineages or Shi Yongxin for that matter, but I will keep that to myself. You need to clarify this Communist repression and scheming in the section on Shao-lin's recent history. You do not mention the fleeing of Shao-lin priests to Taiwan, India, Hong Kong and America, for example - all AMPLY documented.
By the way, I do not require lectures about confusing Mandarin and Cantonese. It is this article that needs to be careful to be more consistent with the romanization systems. Sometimes Wade-Giles is used in place of Pinyin, and sometimes that is preferable!75.21.105.12 (talk) 11:59, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: So fix it yourself. Nothing is holding you back from making edits. Just make sure you leave any personal biases off to the side, and present reliable sources. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 17:37, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
replies: text:  Sage advice to the original post; but I can't see that IP had any "personal biases".--Djathinkimacowboy what now?! 17:21, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I was referring to his emotionally charged statements concerning Communism (e.g., its "iron grip in China") and its supposed negative effects on later Shaolin history. I just wanted to make sure that he provided verifiable references on the subject, as opposed to his opinion. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 20:57, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
replies: text:  Matthew Polly and Gene Ching have a lot to say in support of this CCP "iron grip", I think. Agreed, it must not be emotional or POV, but as I say, lots of citable material does support the general view.--Djathinkimacowboy what now?! 13:21, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Shi Yongxin Fojia 

message: Hi I go around fixing orphans articles, durning my ref searching for Hungarian_Shaolin_Temple I found these links and they seem to be about this article str monks and  the last one I'm not sure if it is the Chinese or the hungarian. Please take a look and let me know. Blackash have a chat 04:34, 24 November 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Found some intresting refs 

message: There's an interesting discussion of these in Martial Arts as Embodied Knowledge: Asian Traditions in a Transnational World, State University of New York, . Dougweller (talk) 15:27, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Founding myths of Kung Fu 

message: Besides the stories about embezzlement and having children with 2 prostitutes, there's the whole story of his more or less making a business of the temple, leading to him being referred to as the CEO monk. Eg "In February he announced plans for Shaolin to build a $297m (£190m) complex in Australia that would include a temple, a hotel, a kung fu academy and a golf course."[]http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/chinas-famous-shaolin-kung-fu-temple-rocked-by-sex-and-embezzlement-scandal-10436369.html] "It could be a sticky end for the monk who has angered some in China by his ruthless commercialization of Shaolin, the birthplace of Chinese martial arts and Zen Buddhism, by renting it out for reality TV shows and computer games among other things..
 and , which has led him to be dubbed the "CEO monk",   recent scandals.   Doug Weller (talk) 15:29, 7 August 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Society sets itself up for this kind of thing. There is a point they are trying to make, which we can't seem to get any other way. When the Tibetans came to vermont they went for alcohol in a big way. The acolytes had to go and buy booze so the monks could whoop it up. No one else was allowed in. I have a report about one of the lecturers. He stood up tall in yellow robes and started in on a Buddhist lecture. Then he started to hawk and spit. He bent over and farted. Then his voice broke and started to beg forgiveness for his age. Another great teacher used to have his students sitting there in asanas under great discipline supposedly meditating. Then he would get up, take out a squirt gun, and start squirting everyone. What's the message, Doug? When he died the sky was full of real rainbows. Everyone said, aw, the monks have thrown something into the air to create rainbows. Who's deluding whom? I suppose we could declare pompously, "what came ye into the wilderness to see?" I don't even want to get started on the other religions. We hear about money-laundering, philandering in a big way, use of monastic facilities for screaming torture while the monks sing hymns.Botteville (talk) 04:23, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Problems concerning current grandmaster Shi Yongxin & the temple 

message: The Shaolin Monastery: History, Religion, and the Chinese Martial Arts By Meir Shahar. Looks extremely useful. Doug Weller (talk) 18:49, 21 November 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  New academic source 

message: :
Is this a mistranslation?  Some institutions have been called "ancient" by their founders ... —Tamfang (talk) 06:32, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  relative age 

message: no ...it makes no sense ...it wouldn't look like that ...just rubbish  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.65.215.149 (talk) 00:50, 9 October 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: You got to remember a large part of this is showmanship, magician stuff. They got it from Sanskrit, which has, for example, meditational exercises to levitate, walk on water, dematerialize, and the like. Not that there is not a true side of Buddhism. You put your credibility down and take what you bought for better or for worse. We can only present what someone else says, true or false.Botteville (talk) 00:21, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  finger-punching tree ...no 

message: the shaolin temple was the last remaining stronghold of the ming dynasty. it was repeatedly attacked by the qing, who failed until they finally burnt it down from the inside with help from spies around 1666. during these ming-qing wars, shaolin was at its biggest & strongest. it was burnt to a crisp and never restored since, just as china has never been chinese-governed since. the qing banned martial arts and have always despised everything about shaolin and its culture. they made a mockery of it by turning it into a gymnastic tourist attraction with no real martial technique only showy stuff. 
this has all been ignored and the impression is given to the contrary - this article makes it look like nothing of significance happened in the 1600s ming era, and makes it look like the 1700s qing only loved the shaolin. utter propaganda. people in china would speak about it today, but they'd be killed for it, hence why it takes a well informed westerner like me to say it.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A00:23C5:E209:E701:E1BD:E09C:91F9:5AF8 (talk) 18:02, 8 December 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: This appears to be two paragraphs of personal opinion. In order to use it you would have to cite who had these opinions, and it can't be you. However, I doubt if there is room for a section such as this. The article just can't cover everything, which is why you are not seeing this and not seeing that. Think you might try some editing? Its tough but it has rewards.Botteville (talk) 00:14, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  propaganda alert 

message: Hello everyone, I just wanted to introduce myself, I am a student that will be editing this page for a class project. I will be using scholarly books, encyclopedias, and perhaps an article or two. For my project, I will be creating a new section, and writing about the oriental warrior monk trope. I plan on finding out how the Shaolin obtained this image, and also the real Shaolin and the knowledge they have to contribute to the world. SChapter (talk) 15:21, 2 November 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi , welcome to Wikipedia, as well as this particular page. Your contributions will no doubt add a much-needed perspective on the topic. As you begin to contribute to the article, please make sure to familiarize yourself with WP:No original research in order to avoid some common pitfalls we all fall prey to. Happy editing! Revirvlkodlaku (talk) 16:41, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

text: I think you have a very interesting subject to talk about and you are using a lot of different sources for that which will definitely make this page more valuable. Your oriental warrior monk trope part will add a lot of important information along with the other parts. I would suggest that you divide them into different parts so that it's easier for the reader to follow and understand. Other than that I think your have a solid plan for you page.  SoloMunn (talk) 04:23, 15 November 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Welcome to WP. I have to add some realistic cautions, however, which may save you some time and trouble. First, this is not a scholarly site. WP does not welcome original research. You can only do what someone else has already done, and you must cite those persons. Granted there is often a fuzzy line between presentation and research. But, if you have a unique point of view, some new insights, putting it here is like casting the proverbial pearls, especially after the attacks begin, and make no mistake, they will begin. So, you need a thick skin if you are going to persist. My co-editors above are being somewhat over-sanguine. Second, this would not be your page and your work as my co-editors suggest. Once you press return you give it to WP. Anyone thereafter can do anything they wish with it whether you like it or not, provided they are careful to follow the editing policy. You might write what you think is an especially fine sentence, and it might be, but someone is sure to hack it right out because you gave no reference for it. Writing for WP takes a lot of patience with no guarantee that anything you write will last very long. You might want to consider some other vehicle. I've seen some pretty fine writers throw up their hands in disgust here. On the other hand, some really useful material has survived. Ciao.Botteville (talk) 00:09, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  oriental monk stereotype 

message: — Assignment last updated by Ziegenbalg66 (talk) 00:35, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title: Wiki Education assignment: Asian Religions in America

message: The infobox chosen for this article is infobox religious building, which implies Buddhism is a religion, and religions, I think you will agree, believe in God. There is a parameter in the box, | deity=. On attempting to fill this in I was squelched - the material deleted with some sarcastic comment. I will not state the editor. This editor could do this because I did not give a reference. The immediate reply to this sort of behavior rudely undiscussed is to find a reference on the Buddhist god. But, there are all sorts of questions, such as, is Buddha God? Is Buddhism a religion? To what do all these names the Buddhists have refer? You might think this is trivial but not so. Some very religious people of different religions deny God ("God is dead") meaning they deny any concept of God, as God is above conceptualization. Zen gives the appearance of such a view, and a physical event called "enlightenment" seems to answer all the questions. Now, here's the problem. We have presented Buddhism as a religion. We see monks showing all kinds of reverence but to this or that deity and especially before statues. However, we never hear what they are reverencing. In short, what shall we put in the "| deity" space? Shall we say god? Shall we list some of the deities Buddhists seem to worship? I'm a Christian myself. In the interest of objectivity I would like you to inform me what I should put for deity. If we cannot get a consensus I will look it up in the best ref I can find and put what they say in. Then you can go through the "referenced material" discussion. I don't need you mistaking your own arrogance and condescension for mine, as one editor did. Go:Botteville (talk) 00:46, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title: Request for consensus

message: By this time it is obvious that this editor and I are not agreeing on anything at all. To date this editor has attempted to revert every change I make. I think it is time to present the truth, as he is moving up in complaints, as he has a right to do, of course. To the idea of wreaking havoc. I am on this article because it was heavily tagged with various kinds of section tags. So, it was in bad shape to start with. There was an initial attempt by me to fill in the "deity parameter" which R. deleted. So, I put that issue out for public review. R. turned that review request into media circus. We are still waiting for word on what to do about that parameter. He refuses to discuss it.
Meanwhile I went on. The section previously marked "buildings" is the ONLY one I have worked on. Take a look at the article. Do you see any havoc there? I chose that because in the wikimedia section I was faced with a category of 1000 unsorted pictures. In sorting them I found I could divide them by building. This division did not correspond to the Shaolin Article and the building section was tagged. I was working on Mount Song. I found the organization of "buildings" was seriously out of date, and it had no references. So, I'm bringing it into line with current developments on the site. This whole falderal is over about 4 paragraphs in one section toward the end of the article. Take a look. What's being wrecked, where's the havoc? Plainly and simply F. is a troublemaker determined to block any improvement of the article any way he can for unstated reasons of his own. As for the other arguments, I do not know what he is talking about. He put up some tags as I requested. I've been answering those with the information he requested. "Duplicating sections" and the other complaints, I do not know what he is talking about. I didn't duplicate any sections. He's done a lot of reverting, just about everything, until I got my references in there. All right. He has a right to ask for references. He got them. What exactly is all this stuff about havoc?  So, the entire issue about whether I am to be allowed to improve this article is now thoroughly aired. The admin must decide. He seems to be requesting arbitration although I have seen no such request. All I have seen is disruption. He reverts referenced material to unreferenced material without discussion. My recommendation is he be blocked from this article so we can get on with improving it. I will of course abide by whatever the admin decides, as one of its functions is to settle issues such as this. I hope these few remarks will help to settle it. Until a decision is made I will continue to update it with referenced material from high-quality sources such a Phd Thesis, UNESCO documents, and others. If you find any chaos or wrecking in the section I have been updating and say I should cease and desist of course I will. Otherwise we cannot allow one loud troublemaker to arbitrarily block any improvement. I hope this covers it.Botteville (talk) 12:14, 2 December 2022 (UTC)
thread_title: The Revirlaku Arguments

message: I am hoping we can put discussions of specific items in here independently of the above issues.Botteville (talk) 12:14, 2 December 2022 (UTC)
thread_title: Content Discussions

message: Hi @SChapter, thank you for adding a new section to the article. I've noticed that you've only included one reference to the section, however, so the bulk of it appears to be original research. Will you be adding more references to support the new content? Revirvlkodlaku (talk) 17:04, 7 December 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  New section 

message: The main problem with the former list of buildings, current and apparently accepted architectural features, was that it is seriously out of date, and except where I have changed it still is. Things seem to happen so fast at that site that our humble material soon gets out of date. I note that most of the building and other features have no articles here, except article of features in general. I have spent some time categorizing the hundreds of pictures by building or feature so I think we are ready for the articles. I guess that at some point I will start doing that but there is plenty of work for all. Meanwhile we have this scanty, out-of-date list. Looking through this sort of material on WP I find that tables are often good-looking substitutes for lists. I propose to turn that list into a table, which would also allow us to put in a picture for such items as have them (a good many do). If no one objects I will do that at some point. Considering that this article is of such interest to so many users I thought I better announce this. I notice that since out great God argument more people have been working on this article and doing so politely. I think reading the penalties for non-cooperation was a bit sobering for us all. Thank you for your courtesy. Incidentally the Shaolin Monastery stele offers indisputable proof that this monastery was Mahayana and believed in God. I'm not yet ready to bring that to this article, might not be for a time. Meanwhile I think you are right to bring unreferenced or poorly referenced ideological material under closest scrutiny. There is a theory, reported in this encyclopedia, that Buddhists do not beleive in God, and that Buddha is not God. There ought to be some balance here. If they don't believe in God, just what were they doing in that monastery, elaborating some kind of elaborate acrobatism for the future movies? I will not be looking at this page again until I get ready to do so.Botteville (talk) 20:14, 29 December 2022 (UTC)
thread_title: Plan for architectural features

message: Hypothetically someone could just remove "Heritage culture" as no one is responding to the call for refs. I would hate to see that happen yet as it is good writing on a topic that needs a place here. The only thing is, it is too good for us here. We aren't allowed to write that good. We call it essay-style, a forbidden style. I checked for possible plagiarism and did not find any. There is ref material on the 4 aspects of Shaolin culture. Probably there should be a subsection on each aspect. I would wait, though, as some of them might be covered earlier in the article. Also, the distinction between native culture and international culture is not being adhered to even though there are sections on both. In view of its potential, I say, let's not delete it yet. Give someone further chance to develop its potential.Botteville (talk) 03:51, 5 January 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: Culture section

message: According to the Continued Biographies of Eminent Monks (AD 645) by Daoxuan, Shaolin Monastery was built on the north side of Shaoshi, the central peak of Mount Song, one of the Sacred Mountains of China, by Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei dynasty in AD 477, to accommodate the Indian teacher Batuo, a dhyāna master who came to China to spread Buddhist teachings beside the capital Luoyang.
I became suspicious of this when I could not find it in the reference, Shahar page 9. I searched through Shahar and could not find it anywhere. I did a general search on Google of the entire first sentence down to Xiaowan. Much to my surprise this sentence is very well copied on a large number of Internet sites. But, they might have copied us. So I searched the books. I did find it on Page 122 of Akhtar Malik's 2007 "A Survey of Buddhist Temple and Mountains" but not in any other book. Unfortunately this is only a snippet view of the searched sentence. It needs verification. So, I did not resort to any of WP's more severe tags. As much of this section and the intro uses paraphrases, it seemed to me someone might have meant to paraphrase and got the source wrong. What I lack is the context in the copied source. Anyone got a copy? I guess we might check WP Library also. I leave this up to you. If you can verify that this is NOT a Copyright vio, go ahead, put it back. I will leave the logical space open, but I don't think it is clear either that Dosen said that or what he could have meant. He is only one source on the foundation, and they do not all agree.Botteville (talk) 05:26, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: Probable cut-paste plagiarism

message: Is this the community consensus? I find such tags off-putting to the lay reader wanting knowledge about a particular topic. I am no expert on this topic and question whether the tag is appropriate. Amuseclio (talk) 00:16, 3 September 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: I proofread it a while back, but it didn't strike me as being written like an advertisement very much. Revirvlkodlaku (talk) 03:12, 3 September 2023 (UTC)
replies: text:  Why does the article include this cleanup tag? Jarble (talk) 02:34, 1 April 2024 (UTC)

text: Ah yes, I see what you mean, and I agree, that does read like an advertisement. Revirvlkodlaku (talk) 02:49, 7 May 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article tag - written as if an advertisement