Talk:Epistle of James

message: See WP:LEAD. The lead should summarize the article and be able to stand on its own. The current lead is nothing like a good Wikipedia lead. Could someone please beef it up? Jonathan Tweet 17:24, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's a controversial book and thus this wikipedia article is subject to POV blanking and edit wars. Catholics and Orthodox claim it invalidates the Protestant doctrine of sola fide, Protestants claim it doesn't. Just read the Catholic Encyclopedia: Epistle of St. James: "Luther strongly repudiated the Epistle as "a letter of straw", and "unworthy of the apostolic Spirit", and this solely for dogmatic reasons, and owing to his preconceived notions, for the epistle refutes his heretical doctrine that Faith alone is necessary for salvation. ... For the question of apparent opposition between St. James and St. Paul with regard to "faith and works" see EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS." 75.15.199.148 18:33, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: If the lead is supposed to show the reader why the topic is interesting, a neutral summary of the controversy belongs there. Jonathan Tweet 12:20, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: To me, the problem is just what goes in the lead, because opinions vary over what are the key points to put in the introduction. To the pious Christian with little interest in Biblical disputes, it is an intensely practical book (no cite there, just a personal observation). To many Protestants and Catholics, it is a key book in the faith/works question, and also perhaps in questions on prayer and healing. To the conservative Bible scholar there is the question of which James wrote it, when, and why. To the more critical Bible scholar, there are also questions of pseudonymity. For a simple Bible dictionary type introduction, one might want to mention its audience and its Jewish character. So... writing a concise and NPOV introduction is tricky, and it looks like everyone's dodged doing it so far :) Peter Ballard 12:53, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Peter, you seem to have a good handle on what goes in the lead. It should be able to stand alone as a concise summary of the topic. Everything you mentioned would fit. The point is to describe everything the book is, not decide which one thing it is. I look at it this way: write it as if the reader is going to read nothing but the lead, and we are going to give them a complete picture of the epistle just with the lead. Jonathan Tweet 13:51, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  lead 

message: User:Rem486 consistently reinstates a paragraph of pure original research.  I've left a 3RR warning on his talk page. Grover cleveland (talk) 14:41, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Rem486 / Original Research

message: I remind users of Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines, Article talk pages should not be used by editors as platforms for their personal views.
Since User Rem486 has written a lot of his personal views on this Talk page, I have put them (as well as old discussions) in the Archive page /Archive 1. I was tempted to delete them altogether, but I instead dumped them in the archive.
Please use this Talk page only for discussing the article, not for talking about pet theories*. Depending on how ruthless I feel, I may simply delete opinion pieces in future. Peter Ballard (talk) 01:36, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Correct use of Talk Page / Archive Created

message: With these two edits I removed a paragraph that contained an alternative theory that the epistle was written by James the Great. I don't have any problem with this theory per se, but it needs a source. The paragraph was also awkwardly placed, in that an earlier paragraph had already established that evidence points to James the brother [or half-brother] of Jesus. Therefore, I have no problem with someone reinserting the following text into the article if a reliable source can be located for the hypothesis:
::Authorship has also occasionally been attributed to the apostle James the Great, brother of John the Evangelist and son of Zebedee The letter does mention persecutions in the present tense (2:6), and this is consistent with the persecution in Jerusalem during which James the Great was martyred (Acts 12:1). If written by James the Great, the location would have also been Jerusalem, sometime before 45AD.
I am (not) Iron Man (talk) 03:32, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  My edits 

message: This article is a mess. It contains no clear organisation, and sadly, like a lot of the articles on the texts of Christianity, seems to contain a lot of OR from amateurs who are interpreting it from there own religious tradition and are not aware that that interpretation is not the global one. I am starting to clear out the obvious WP:OR. If you disagree with a chop, please re-include with a clear cite that makes the point (not four cites provided as evidence that you synthesise).
The 'Alterative interpretation' section is the worst. The name does not make it clear what it is interpreting and what it is an alternative to. It seems to contain a lot of original research and gives undue weight to something that may be a minority interpretation. Ashmoo (talk) 09:52, 4 June 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that this article poorly organized. Lets work to make it more consistent with the Wikipedia article on the Epistle to the Romans.Patrick Fisher 20:34, 31 August 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cleanup 

message: As far as I see, the majority of scholars considers James to be pseudepigraphical, it could not possibly have been composed by an actual follower of Jesus. As of now, the article first presents speculations about which James from the gospels could have written it, but fails to mention that this view does not at all represent the majority view among contemporary scholars. --Johannes Rohr (talk) 15:31, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  shoud present majority view first, rather than traditionalist view 

message: We've got a bit of pro-Catholic POV in the article here where. In the section "Doctrine," sub-section "Justification" we find this little gem: "However, this position [i.e. a Protestant position on justification] does not make Biblical, Traditional or Logical sense. Furthermore, the Bible clearly and unequivocally teaches that "a person is justified by works and not by faith alone." (NABRE James 2:24)."  It was added by an anonymous IP. I removed it, explaining that it introduced a particular POV and therefore had to go. It was added back in by the same anonymous IP. Since the IP address seems unwilling to discuss the issue, and because policy forbids me from edit-warring, I'm in a bit of a bind here. Any suggestions on how I should handle this? For the record, I have absolutely no problem with the article discussion Catholic interpretations, or any other interpretations, of the Epistle of James. I just want WP:NPOV followed, in that Wikipedia should describe theological positions without endorsing them, whether from a Pro-Protestant, Pro-Catholic, Pro-Muslim, Pro-Jewish, or Pro-anything-else standpoint.Alephb (talk) 01:59, 21 February 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Please try to sign your talk page posts. To do that, write four tildes at the end of your comments (~~~~). That way people can tell when you said something, as well as what your username is. If you need further instruction on this, see WP:SIGN.Alephb (talk) 21:21, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

text: If you have some concrete idea for making the article better, go right ahead and change it or describe how you want it changed on this talk page. But vague complaints about mysterious changes, without detail, don't do us any good at all. Alephb (talk) 21:22, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

text: Please try to sign your talk page posts. To do that, write four tildes at the end of your comments (Alephb (talk) 10:59, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

text: If there is significant support for the pre-crucifixion position in reliable sources (WP:RS), then you are free to edit the article to add your idea. Alephb (talk) 10:59, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

text: There's nobody named Ικοβιυς anywhere in the Bible. Not one. You've gotten things mixed up. Anyhow, if you want the article to include the opinion that the epistle of James was written before the crucifixion, you'd need to find reliable sources confirming that James was written before the crucifixion. If you're not going to do that, there's no reason to keep complaining here on the talk page. Alephb (talk) 02:48, 30 July 2018 (UTC)

text: Also, please sign your posts by typing four tildes after your name (~~~~). That will display the time you made your comment as well. That's a required thing on Wikipedia. Alephb (talk) 02:49, 30 July 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: "There's nobody named Ικοβιυς" No wonder, as the name is misspelled. The Greek version of the name is "Ἰάκωβος" (Iakovos). It is based on the name Jacob. Dimadick (talk) 06:06, 30 July 2018 (UTC)

text: It influences other editors, allowing them to keep track of comments in any given talk page, without having to check your edit history. Dimadick (talk) 10:49, 31 July 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: Also, please sign your posts by typing four tildes after your name (~~~~). That will display the time you made your comment as well. That's a required thing on Wikipedia. Alephb (talk) 23:06, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

text: Well, when you do check back, try and remember to sign your posts by typing four tildes after your name (~~~~). That will show us who made the post, and when, which is helpful. Alephb (talk) 21:58, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

text: The comment immediately above this one was made December 10th. In the future, please sign your comments with four tildes ( ~~~~ ), so that we can see when you make your comments. Also, put your most recent comment below all the previously existing comments in a thread. Alephb (talk) 05:17, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

text: Hello Rem, when you do your inevitable "checking in" to remind us all of your WP:FRINGE views on when the epistle was written, please remember to put your newest comments at the bottom of whatever thread your commenting in. Otherwise the whole conversation starts drifting out of chronological. Alephb (talk) 20:06, 4 January 2019 (UTC)

text: I'm glad to have brightened your mood. Alephb (talk) 02:00, 16 January 2019 (UTC)

text: This talk page is discussing ways to improve the article, not for advertizing Kindle Books. Alephb (talk) 02:42, 10 January 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pro-Catholic POV 

message: The third paragraph says "Famously, Luther disliked the Epistle". Should it add that this is because the epistle seems to go against Luther's concept of "solafidianism" (justification by faith alone) and emphasises how faith needs works? Vorbee (talk) 06:38, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
thread_title: Third paragraph

message: The view that the epistle is orthonymous is WP:FRINGE. The claim  is fake. Perhaps it counts as true in evangelical colleges and universities, but it is not true from the Ivy League to US state universities. Richard Elliott Friedman and Shaye J. D. Cohen would never teach as true that the epistle is orthonymous. Neither would Bart Ehrman, nor Dale Martin. The attempt to pass that as academic consensus is fanciful at best, disingenuous at worst. tgeorgescu (talk)  13:42, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fringe view 

message: "James and Paul both teach that salvation is by faith alone and also that faith is never alone but shows itself to be alive by deeds of love that express a believer's thanks to God for the free gift of salvation by faith in Jesus." James taught that salvation was by faith alone? Serioulsly? rem486 ````  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rem486 (talk • contribs) 12:42, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Delusional, pure delusion 

message: General Epistles versus Catholic Epistles, they mean the same term should both be mentioned or use a word that goes around the wiki debate? Doremon764 (talk) 03:30, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  General Epistles/Catholic Epistles