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Revision as of 14:09, 14 May 2009

Proselytizing?

Two suggestions/questions. 1. Should this article be renamed?
To elaborate... Jehovah's Witnesses do not describe their disciple-making as "proselytizing" because the term has come to be associated with sometimes-illegal coerced conversion rather than with informed voluntary conversion.

Note this reference to JW thought:

"All True Christians Are Evangelizers", The Watchtower, January 1, 2002, subheading "Proselytize or Evangelize?", page 11-12, "The Greek language has the word pro·se’ly·tos, which means a “convert.” From this has come the English word “proselytism,” which basically means “the act of making converts.” Nowadays, some say that proselytism is harmful. A document published by the World Council of Churches even speaks of “the sin of proselytism.” Why? The Catholic World Report states: “Under the steady hammering of Orthodox complaints, ‘proselytism’ has taken on the connotation of forcible conversion.” Is proselytism harmful? It can be. ...Are conversions forced today? In a sense, some are. Certain missionaries of Christendom reportedly offer overseas scholarships to potential converts. Or they may make a starving refugee sit through a sermon in order to obtain a ration of food. According to a statement issued in 1992 by a convention of Orthodox Primates, “proselytism sometimes occurs through material enticement and sometimes by various forms of violence.” Pressuring people to change their religion is wrong. Certainly, Jehovah’s Witnesses do not act in such a way. Hence, they do not proselytize in the modern meaning of the word."

Note this reference to laws prohibiting proselytism:

"European High Court Upholds Right to Preach in Greece", The Watchtower, September 1, 1993, page 28-29, "The Greek Constitution (1975), Article 13, states: “Proselytism is prohibited.” Consider further the Greek law, section 4, numbers 1363/1938 and 1672/1939, which makes proselytism a criminal offense. It says: “By ‘proselytism’ is meant, in particular, any direct or indirect attempt to intrude on the religious beliefs of a person of a different religious persuasion . . . , with the aim of undermining those beliefs, either by any kind of inducement or promise of an inducement or moral support or material assistance, or by fraudulent means"

Furthermore, "proselytize" can connote either disciple-making (the results-oriented and most-literal meaning of the term) or it can connote merely public preaching without regard for whether any converts are made.

This article in particular seems to have become focused on JW publications for disciple-making, perhaps more encyclopedically stated as JW publications for potential baptizands . It seems right to separate these particular publications (and this article) from those publications typically used only to canvass (preach publicly), address a specific issue, or for personal and congregation study; the latter may be printed in less than ten million copies each. In the current article Jehovah's Witnesses publications for proselytizing, each of the discussed disciple-making publications has generally had significantly higher visibility (each in tens of millions of copies) compared to their other publications. At any given time, JWs only name one primary study aid which they recommend to educate a student sufficiently for baptism.

The most prevalent use of the word "proselytize" refers to making converts, not merely public preaching (see wikt:proselytize). The article about laws prohibiting proselytism is in regard to Greek prohibition of the form of proselytizing that JWs perform, not about whether the method JWs use can be called proselytism. The JW preference to avoid the word 'proselytize' is not the determining factor for naming the article, and I didn't consider the term to be negative. However, after reviewing Evangelize#Evangelism_or_proselytism, I agree with renaming it to 'evangelizing' instead; (the terms 'evangelizing' and 'proselytizing' both seem more common than 'disciple-making').--Jeffro77 (talk) 08:04, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Suggestion/question 2. To keep this JW publications for potential baptizands material separate from their dozens of other publications, should this article explicitly refer to a new separate article with JW publications for public preaching ?

I have a feeling that the notability of even these publications will be disputed (which has already begun with the rapid tagging), as reliable third-party sources vouching for their notability seem somewhat lacking. Therefore, I don't think their other publications for preaching would be notable enough for an article on their own.--Jeffro77 (talk) 08:04, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Consolidation articles

JWs have so many publications that most titles need not be discussed at all, much less individually in individual Misplaced Pages articles. Several notable publications have rightly been consolidated already into articles such as this one, currently named:

Jehovah's Witnesses publications for proselytizing.

Two other existing consolidating articles are currently named:

Jehovah's Witnesses reference works, and

Jehovah's Witnesses publications for youths.

It seems obvious that a similar consolidation article could replace certain additional existing articles. For example,

Jehovah's Witnesses publications for adherents would consolidate and accept redirects from:

Pay Attention to Yourselves and to All the Flock, and

Shining as Illuminators in the World, and

Organized to Do Jehovah's Will, and

Sing Praises to Jehovah.

Again, JWs have so many publications that most titles need not be discussed at all. However, the topic of JW publications for public preaching or JW publications for the public should certainly be discussed, since it is a hallmark of the JW movement and they have for decades run the largest nongovernmental inplant printing operation in history. Watchtower was begun as a "Bible and tract" society; initially its entire readership was "the public".

I recommend renaming the article currently titled Jehovah's Witnesses publications for youths more generally; that article renamed

Jehovah's Witnesses publications for public preaching or Jehovah's Witnesses publications for the public would consolidate and accept redirects from:

The Photo-Drama of Creation, and Scenario of the Photo-Drama of Creation, and

Life — How Did It Get Here? By Evolution or by Creation?, and

The Secret of Family Happiness, ironically deleted just this week, and

My Book of Bible Stories (will already be there)

Repurposing the "...for youths" article more generally as "...for public preaching" (or "...for the public") seems obvious for that article.

--AuthorityTam (talk) 18:17, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Notability of the publications for youths is yet to be established, and this must be done before creating another article about even less-notable publications.--Jeffro77 (talk) 22:04, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Renaming this article

Regarding this article (currently named Jehovah's Witnesses publications for proselytizing), it's been acknowledged that the term "proselytizing" has real issues; an alternate title should be terse, technically accurate, and distinct from Jehovah's Witnesses publications for public preaching (or Jehovah's Witnesses publications for the public). The publications discussed in this article are, again, uniquely recommended and used specifically for students with formal Bible study courses eventually progressing toward baptism as JWs. Since "baptizand" already implies "potential", I'd recommend renaming this article to Jehovah's Witnesses publications for baptizands or Jehovah's Witnesses publications for potential baptizands. While "baptizand" usually means "baptismal candidate", it very occasionally means "baptized person", so it ironically fits quite well in this article's title.

While Jehovah's Witnesses publications for evangelizing would be more tolerable (than "...for proselytizing"), the term 'evangelizing' fails to connote an obvious distinction from Jehovah's Witnesses publications for public preaching. Additionally, some may sincerely and scholarly object to the idea that it's possible to perform "evangelizing" and "disciple-making" among existing Christians ('disciples of Christ') who already embrace the Gospels (literally "good news" or evangel/'eu·ag·ge·li′zo·mai' in Greek), at least ostensibly.

--AuthorityTam (talk) 18:17, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

The word 'baptizand' is not a common word, and it refers to the baptism candidate in relation to the actual act of being baptized. Organized to do Jehovah's Will (and its earlier revisions) is the only JW publication that could be rightly termed a 'publication for baptizands'. Many people who begin studying these (other) publications have no intention of getting baptized, and usually aren't informed of any such obligation at the outset. Support 'publications for evangelizing'.--Jeffro77 (talk) 22:04, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

You're probably right (although "baptizand" has been used differently over the centuries and today).

Jehovah's Witnesses publications for evangelizing is probably a more appropriate rename than

Jehovah's Witnesses publications for potential baptizands. I don't know how to do an article rename.

--AuthorityTam (talk) 14:09, 14 May 2009 (UTC)