Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kuzari Principle

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Although numerically this has 5 keeps and 4 deletes, the keeps imply that there is notability, without providing reliable sources for this. The sources provided in the article are blogs and self-published works. As such there is no evidence as far as those in favour of deletion are concerned that it meets the criteria for inclusion, and so this would appear to be the consensus here -- PhantomSteve/talk|contribs\ 16:16, 19 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Kuzari Principle[edit]

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I can't find evidence for notability. One book mention (and the book is the only book from its publisher) and it is based on the self-published work of Rabbi Dovid Gottlieb (a Lulu.com book and his website [1]. A number of blog discussions mention it, but that isn't sufficient to establish notability. Dougweller (talk) 08:46, 12 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I created the article not because I was interested in the "Kuzari Principle" but because I wanted to save the Kuzari article. The "Kuzari principle" is a fundamentalist talking point and had no business dominating an entry dedicated to a major medieval thinker "Kuzari." I dont want to see this material returned to the Kuzari article. Maybe place it on the Dovid Gottlieb page? --Jayrav (talk) 14:24, 12 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think there is a good argument for merging this to his page, at least until it starts to show up in reliable sources, eg boos by religious thinkers, journal articles, etc. Dougweller (talk) 14:30, 13 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

- Note: Presumably, we can take it that based on User Jayrav (talk · contribs)'s defense of creating this article here, he counts as a Keep. IZAK (talk) 08:51, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Delete as entirely non notable. If the fear is it will be added to other articles, just delete it from those as well for not having a reliable source. DreamGuy (talk) 17:04, 12 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep -a fundamental argument for the truth of Judaism and acore tenet of faith. Noodleki (talk) 13:24, 13 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Comment That's the issue - if it is, why isn't there a lot published about it? We can't accept editors' opinions based on the fact they like it as a reason, reasons should be based on policies and guidelines. Dougweller (talk) 14:25, 13 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - the article is based on a work by Professor Rabbi Gottlieb [Professor of Philosophy at Johns Hopkins University] who published two other books (one of them by Oxford University Press) I think that can count as notability. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Holoner (talk • contribs) [2]

Comment Has he actually had something published about it? Someone like that publishing through Lulu.com might be doing that because no one will publish it. Dougweller (talk) 14:24, 13 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

His OUP book is Ontological Economy: Substitutional Quantification and Mathematics. Dougweller (talk) 14:28, 13 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Delete "Fundamental arguments" and "core tenets of faith" would be mentioned in more than one book. Edward321 (talk) 00:36, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Judaism-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 01:52, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Philosophy-related deletion discussions. -- • Gene93k (talk) 01:52, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - After reading it I saw that it presents an NPOV look at both sides of one of the major arguments used in favor of the divine nature of Judaism. An example of it in use by a major Jewish religious organization Aish Hatorah is this article where the Kuzari principle is framed in a lighthearted and modern fashion. Similar articles can be found in many places. Kelman's book mentioned in the article is a well-known formulation of the concept. There is a question about the article name in that it may not be the best one or the most commonly used. If an alternate, more common, name can be proposed that would be great but the concept and the the article are definitely notable.Joe407 (talk) 05:03, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment What is the most common name then? This is important. If the argument is used elsewhere without this name, then we may have a problem. See my comment below on original research. Dougweller (talk) 09:28, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep this well-reasoned and important article that's an excellent key to understanding Jewish philosophy and the history and reasons for the Khazars' conversion to Judaism. The article cites WP:RS and meets all requirements of WP:NPOV, WP:CITE and WP:NOTABILITY. It is based on and derived from the famous classical book by Rabbi Yehuda Halevi, The Kuzari. IZAK (talk) 08:36, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment on sourcing It's badly sourced, it does not meet our sourcing standards. It uses a self-published book for one of its few sources, plus a personal website. It uses no properly published books, no journal articles. It is basically original research full of what some text doesn't have, 'if this then that' statements, etc. It might make a good essay but it is a bad article. The article is about a 'Kuzari Principle' yet I'm still waiting for evidence not that elements of the argument made in the article are notable, but that this 'principle' with the name it has is notable. Blogs and personal websites and self-published books aren't enough. If it's notable, why hasn't it been mentioned in journal articles, books on Jewish history or theology, etc? Dougweller (talk) 09:28, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - - Hi Dougweller, you ask "If it's notable, why hasn't it been mentioned in journal articles, books on Jewish history or theology, etc?" (firstly, who says you are right? because both the original source book, The Kuzari is a Jewish and philosophy classic, and its author, Rabbi Yehuda Halevi one of Judaism's most famous thinkers, are widely discussed and analyzed, as a Google search would easily show), but the answer is very simple, because the bulk of those journals and books that deal with Jewish history and theology are mostly written by secular, often atheistic, non-religious Jews or non-Jewish professors often serious Christians themselves, who know nothing about this method of thought and study, and were they to admit to the principle of this article (it is not OR, since it's based on Halevi's work The Kuzari!), they would have to renounce their secular, atheistic, non-traditional and often anti-Jewish notions and prejudices as being wrong and false and they would then be obliged to renounce their former beliefs and admit that the arguments put forth by Rabbi Yehuda Halevi, the original author of The Kuzari from which the Kuzari Principle is straightforwardly and directly presented and applied, logically proves beyond a doubt the classical positions of ancient Judaism with all its concomitant beliefs and commandments as expressed in the Torah. So that to reject this article is to in effect cut off a proverbial nose of Judaism to spite the face of classical Judaism's theological and secular opponents, which is self-defeating for the building of a neutral encyclopedia because WP needs articles like this that explain, both the pros and cons mind you in WP:NPOV fashion, as this article does. This matter is about Jewish theology, Jewish philosophy, and classical Judaism that is certainly well-known to virtually all serious Orthodox Judaism scholars and one requires a good grounding in that field to oppose serious topics from it that sound more like WP:IDONTLIKEIT than an appropriate desire to understand what the subject is about in the first place. Perhaps it would be wise to start a discussion at WP:TALKJUDAISM first to see what a wider spectrum of Judaic editors would opine on this entire matter. Thanks for your understanding, IZAK (talk) 07:37, 15 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Which of these mentions the Kuzari Principle by that name? Seriously, you don't seem to understand the point here. And being 'based on Halevi's work The Kuzari' does not mean it isn't OR. Again, you don't seem to understand what WP:OR means. The article has to reflect what reliable sources say about the subject. Why can't anyone find any reliable sources that discuss the Kuzari Principle? Not sources discussing an argument, sources actually naming this principle. We should not be discussing the 'principle of this article', but the notability of something with this name. As it stands, it might make an excellent essay for a journal (I can't comment on that), but it definitely doesn't meet our guidelines and policies. Dougweller (talk) 08:12, 15 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I do not think Izak is correct. It is not in the Kuzari and it is not unnamed due to secular bias. It is neither in the Haredi edition by Rabbi Sarna of Chevron Yeshiva nor the modern commentary of Rabbi Aviner nor the medieval Hebrew commentators on the book or the new Hebrew translation from the Arabic by Rosh Yeshiva Rabbi Yitzhak Shilat. It does seem to be a principle that uses the Kuzari and develops an argument in the manner that an analytic philosopher would develop an argument from an historical work of thought. It seems to have originated with Dale- Dovid Gottlieb, a trained analytic philosopher who became Ultra-Orthodox in the 1980's. It is an argument proving revelation. It has become an accepted and seemingly hoary idea within English speaking Orthodox Jewish circles connected to the Gottlieb, despite its recent formulation. I do think the article is fair to both sides and it is not WP:OR. "Kuzari Principle" is like "Intelligent Design" or "Creationist" which should not be on the Darwin or Biology pages.It is not found in any historical or philosophic work but it is in all the ephemera of our era. In this case the ephemera should count as sources the way newspaper articles on current trends count. In order not to be WP:OR the content would need to be limited to these sources.Would wiki have included an entry on Bible Codes before Drosnin took an idea that was widely circulating and wrote a bestseller?--Jayrav (talk) 23:13, 15 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

User Dougweller is bordering on being pedantic (in the scholarly sense), since he wants to see the title of a 21st century book by a respected author and academic in the 21st century listed in a work written about 9 centuries earlier and if he can't find that exact title, or wording for the title of that latter-day book or latter-day wording derived from the core principles of The Kuzari, i.e. that all of Israel witnessed the Revelation of God at Mount Sinai, unlike Christianity and Islam or other religions that make no claims that their Deity revealed himself to the entire set of believers at one time and that that revelation is kept alive as a fundamental of why Jews believe in God based on God's original revelation that was witnessed by an entire nation, a principle that is stressed by the narrating "rabbi" in The Kuzari itself, and why all of Israel accepted the Torah and its commandments there, which a key point that Rabbi Yehudah Halevi makes in convincing the King of the Khazars to convert to a religion like Judaism that has remained true too all its principles for millennia), then somehow if the words "Kuzari Principle" are absent in their modern sense, that that somehow "invalidates" Rabbi Dr. Dovid Gottlieb's directly derivative work. Gottlieb is "inventing" nothing and there is no "OR" taking place, if anything he is a WP:NOTABLE person worthy of his own WP WP:BLP. He has a sterling reputation in both the academic world where he served as a professor of logic and philosophy and as a rabbi and Torah scholar where he has been on the faculty of several yeshivas in Israel. He is using the language and style of modern academic logic to elaborate and extrapolate, in typical rabbinic fashion, what Rabbi Yehudah Halevi taught in The Kuzari. User Jayrav gives it more leeway, but the fact remains he is for this article no matter which you slice it. IZAK (talk) 06:07, 16 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Delete as non-notable. With it's synthesized pro and con arguments and editorial asides, it's somewhere between WP:OR and WP:ESSAY. - LuckyLouie (talk) 17:51, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.