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Martin Luther

This article is a perfect example of a well written, comprehensible, and neutral article. It incorporates quotations and pictures smoothly into the text, and provides refrences for everything. It is an of an appropriate length, yet still gives all the information that is required. It also complies with the style manual, and has an appropriate table of contents length. Overall, this article is informative, neutral, and very well written. Thetruthbelow 16:31, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

NOTE: This article has 46KB of prose as of 24 June 2006. See Misplaced Pages:Summary style.

NOTE: This article has 51KB of prose as of 15 June 2006. See Misplaced Pages:Summary style. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Maveric149 (talk • contribs)

• Support Sounds good to me. Ptmccain 16:51, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
• Comment: The following suggestions were generated by a semi-automatic javascript program.
  • Per WP:WIAFA, Images should have concise captions.
  • There may be an applicable infobox for this article. For example, see Template:Infobox Biography, Template:Infobox School, or Template:Infobox City.

Done --CTSWyneken 02:10, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

• • Per WP:MOS#Headings, headings generally do not start with the word "The". For example, ==The Biography== would be changed to ==Biography==.

Done, removed all "The" articles from subheadings.Ptmccain 19:47, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

• • Please alphabetize the categories and interlanguage links.

Done--CTSWyneken 00:30, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

• • Per WP:WIAFA, this article's table of contents (ToC) maybe too long- consider shrinking it down by merging short sections or using a proper system of daughter pages as per WP:SS.
  • This article may need to undergo summary style, where a series of appropriate subpages are used. For example, if the article is United States, than an appropriate subpage would be History of the United States, such that a summary of the subpage exists on the mother article, while the subpage goes into more detail.
  • As is done in WP:FOOTNOTE, for footnotes, the footnote should be located right after the punctuation mark, such that there is no space inbetween. For example, change blah blah . to blah blah.

Done--CTSWyneken 11:02, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

• • Please ensure that the article has gone through a thorough copyediting so that the it exemplifies some of Misplaced Pages's best work. See also User:Tony1/How to satisfy Criterion 2a.
  • You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas.
  • Thanks, Andy _t 00:48, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

• Support Very well written, very informative, long, inline citations included. (Wikimachine 01:21, 16 June 2006 (UTC))

• Support, provisionally. It's mostly well written—congrats. But you could get someone else to go through it and polish it. Here's a snake that needs to be chopped up: "Luther was born to Hans and Margarethe Luther, née Ziegler , on 10 November 1483, in Eisleben, Germany, and was baptized the next day, on the feast day of St. Martin of Tours, after whom he was named." Seven commas, too.

Done by Ptmccain. --CTSWyneken 19:30, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

A few random problems I spotted at the top:

• • Influenced the doctrine and culture of traditions—category problem.
  • "can not"—this should be "cannot"; it's a translation of a quote, so it can be fixed.
  • "His family moved to Mansfeld in 1484, where his father first worked in, then operated, copper mines." Did he work in and then operate every day? It's just a little unclear, but it's a minor point.
  • "Having risen from the peasantry, Hans Luther was determined to see his eldest son serve as a lawyer." I'd be happier not implying that lawyers serve anyone but themselves. What about "become a lawyer"?

Done by Ptmccain. --CTSWyneken 19:44, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

• • "In this way, Martin would bring further honor to the family. "Further"?
  • "... sent to schools in Mansfeld and Magdeburg, where he attended a school.... He then attended school in Eisenach." Can you avoid the repetition?

I'm concerned that most readers won't realise that a "hymn" is just the words; the sentence talks of congregational singing. Did Luther write the music too? (I think that he did, so this could be explicit—it's unexpected that he should have been a composer as well.)

The "Early life" section is short, and comprises three paragraphs, two of which are stubby. Can you do a structural audit of the whole text to ensure optimal cohesion and flow? Tony 10:43, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

• Support, with work for us to do yet, per Tony and the 'bot. --CTSWyneken 11:23, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

• Support a well-written article and not a vandal's target. (unlike the Diet of Worms article) Anonymous__Anonymous 11:58, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

• Suppport, with reservations. Well written and supported, but I find it hard to understand Luther without more context. The article has a brief mention of Zwingli and a few other contemporary dissenters, but no disucssion of prior dissenters. It notes actions of certain anabaptists and has him reacting to their radicalism without any explication of the substance of the dispute (was it just the violence or was there any substance or social explanation?). Similarly, the article doesn't mention Calvin at all, and has no substantive discussion of the Counter-Reformation and the reaction to his work, yet the Calvinist and Catholic reactions to Luther are among the most important topics in European history. I think a "legacy" or "influence" section and an "historical background" or "context" discussion would be useful, even if they are short and primarily create bridges to other articles. This is an excellent biography as such, but doesn't take full advantage of Misplaced Pages's ability to weave an article about an isolated topic into the whole. Still, worthy of FA status. Sam 13:16, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
• Support. This article has been written through the joint effort of many Wikipedians, and represents the "blood, sweat, and tears" that go into making this the best online source of encyclopedic information on the web.--Drboisclair 02:02, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

• Sorry to appear to be high-handed, but at a later stage, I'll not want to be able to pick out problem sentences at random. If that is still possible, I'll change to Object. This is what my eyes first came across:

"Soon terms like penance and righteousness took on new meaning for Luther, and he became convinced that the Church had lost sight of several of the central truths of Christianity taught in Scripture — the most important of them being the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Luther began to teach that salvation is completely a gift of God's grace through Christ received by faith alone. "

• • Perhaps it's a stylistic matter, but many writers would agree that "Soon, terms such as ..." is preferable at the start.
  • If they "took on a new meaning", why not tell us more about it; this appears to be important to understanding the man, yet it's vague. Is the text largely copied from another source? (I don't mean to accuse; I'm just trying to determine the circumstances of the writing of the text—it may help us to improve it.)
  • "in Scripture"—I suppose that we need the upper-case S (do we?), but why is it "the Scriptures" above? Consider using the same terminology.
  • There are a few instances of "began to ..." that I don't like; it indicates a starting point, and begs for a year. It also begs the question of whether this new state of affairs continued right through his life. Better wording required?

So there's serious work to do before this is "compelling, even brilliant" prose. Tony 10:19, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Comment: thanks, Tony! Your comments are appreciated. When time permits, if no one gets there first, I'll tend to your points. --CTSWyneken 10:53, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

• Support Nicely written, lots of references. Looks good to me. NuncAutNunquam 00:38, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
• Object. ToC is rather long and should be more then one level (use 2nd and 3rd level headings). No references: notes should be retitled references and bibliography further reading. See also is very long, merge with text and remove section.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 05:02, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

  Please Note The Notes section has been renamed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Thetruthbelow (talk • contribs)

Comment: Thanks of the suggestions, Piotrus! We've been struggling with the TOC since yesterday and will keep in mind your suggestion for subsections. Do you have a page that fits your criteria that you'd recommend we study? --CTSWyneken 10:41, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Please look at my userpage: in top left section you will find a list of FAs I have worked on. The newest one are usually better then the old, and I hope they give you some ideas (especially the biographies).--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 15:53, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose – A> needs to be written in sumamry form. B> ToC placement is odd C> Images squeeze the text in between, reduce the presence of so many images. D> Heading not according to MoS: Monastic and Academic Life -->: Monastic and academic life E> Left aligned images cause the headings to be pushed to the right. =Nichalp «Talk»= 10:46, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
• Object; summary style please. And use subsections, not level two sections for everything. The TOC is huge, and poorly placed. Some sections are short and need to be merged into other sections (Small and Large Catechisms, Peasants' War, Theology of Grace, etc.). The supplementary sections (starting with the inexplicable "Bibliography" section) are extremely non-standard. Also, images per Nichalp (some people still use 800x600). --Spangineer (háblame) 12:49, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
• Please Note I have fixed the layout of the page, including the TOC. For all that opposed because of this reason, please inspect the page now. Thetruthbelow 03:25, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
• SuppportObject on layout. The TOC comes after the first (Early life) section and the TOC forces some sections to the right. Also, the Luther seal should not be split by the line on the left. Rlevse 17:19, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

For those working on this, I'd suggest a review of Misplaced Pages:Section#Floating the TOC. Frankly, the thing looks horrible right now, and should not float into the first section. I would suggest deleting the TOC codes and working with the default. Sam 18:11, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

We're in a no-win situation with that one, folks. If we go to the default code, we end up with a ton of white space. It is very difficult to fill that space. I don't like it that way, I do not like it this way, either. So, any suggestions? --CTSWyneken 18:45, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

• Object; no offense, but while the doctrinal side and major historical events of his life are meticulously, and even brilliantly detailed, the man himself is described in such sanctified terminology and bowdlerizing his earthy character in toto, that the image of the person is not only un-recognizable, but indeed false. I am sorry if that is a blunt statement, but it cannot be put more nicely. I respectfully submit that (coming as I do from a country with an Evangelical Lutheran state church) Finnish or German Lutherans are much more comfortable with a human Luther of Flesh and Bone, than American Lutherans. While this is is the English Language wikipedia, I seriously question whether that is good enough justification to let a bowdlerized, stylized image of Luther suffice here. In my view such particularism should not fly, at least in matters of content. -- Cimon avaro; on a pogostick. 10:35, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
• P.S. I specifically refer to for example this line from the German version of the same article: Auch Luthers Predigten und Schriften waren in einer kräftigen und volksnahen Sprache verfasst, wobei er vulgäre Ausdrücke nicht verschmähte. Bekannt wurden viele deftige Zitate wie: „Aus einem glücklichen Arsch kommt ein fröhlicher Furz.“ - references to even such subtle hints (he was really much more earthy even than that) at the human Luther behind the religious figure, have been systematically excised from the article no matter how many times and how carefully worded, not to offend. I really must put the foot down here. -- Cimon avaro; on a pogostick. 10:58, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Comment Thank you for yout comment. However, I do not see what you would find necessary to change in the article. We have cited the article thoroughly. The dilemma ahead of us is that the article is already overlong for an encyclopedia presentation. Why is it necessary to detail aspects of Luther's personality, such as his vulgarity? After all, we see nothing of the kind in article printed in physica; encyclopedias, nor are their similar details in articles like: Henry VIII of England, Erasmus and his contemporaries. (The latter does not even detail the humanist's anti-semitism). So why, in our context, is this needed? --CTSWyneken 14:49, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

• Comment Shortening the TOC would help. Rlevse 18:48, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
• Comment Part of the problem before was that with short headings (generally a good thing) and only one level to your TOC (generally a bad thing), the white space was just enormous. With two levels and at least one longer heading, there will be less white space now. But I'd be tempted to move one of the photos you'd like to have larger to run side-by-side with the TOC. It probably means getting rid of the Luther seal, but that could be stuck down at the end to decorate the lengthy notes, bibliography, etc. If you're looking to shorten the TOC, you can do it by moving some of the sections at the end out of the TOC, using bulleting instead of a heading that appears in the TOC (I did this, for example, to the references section of Franklin D. Roosevelt to address the same complaint during the FA process). Sam 19:03, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
• Comment THe current main page FA, Absinthe, has the TOC and spacing very similar to the way yours is right now. I think it'd be fine. Rlevse 19:06, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Comment Exactly the point. Thanks! The problem with moving it down is that we have an editor that really likes it where it is. I've got to admit, is is quite attractive. I tried the reduce to bullets trick, but that eliminated second level headings, which folk did not like. Yes, I agree that its probably OK, but it still bothers me. It says, "fill me! fill me!" I keep thinking, this is to be a feature article. It should be the best. But every technique I know, going back to HTML 1.0 results in funny spacing. I'm at a loss as to how to fill it. Does anyone know how to create some sort of info box that wouldn't look bad, fit like a glove, provide good information and the coding tricks to put it there? --CTSWyneken 19:12, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure there is a solution. In books, these things go on separate pages so they don't much up the works, but here, there is no way around that list with dead white space on the side. But, it is a part of every Misplaced Pages article, so everyone knows where to look or where to scroll on by. But embedding it makes it all worse, since then it gets in the way of the actual article. Sam 19:33, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

• Comment In my impression this english version of the Misplaced Pages Texts about Luther is not better than the german one. And the german Version was not able to become a featured article despite there have been four candidate runs in the last year. The reason is clear for the german version: it ist lacking essential parts in theology, the chapter about music and liturgy is rudimentary and the important eucharistic controversy is not so well documented. This is also true for the english version. Shurely I will not object in this case, because i cannot contribute to this article. But the deficites should be obvious to the authors. Greetings -- Andreas Werle 00:40, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments, Andy; to declare object or support, you don't have to be able to contribute. Tony 04:34, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

• Conditional Support -- I think the header "Luther's Excommunication" should be renamed so that it doesn't imply that he actually was excommunicated. "Widening breach" is not clear enough in its meaning. The Diet of Worms section should explain what the Diet of Worms actually was (just in a sentence). Lastly, the large scale structure is too linear; there needs to be more leveling in the TOC. I'd like to see the whole thing divided into "Biography" and "Views" or something similar. The article gets very dense at the end and doesn't flow. Otherwise, this is a great article; an achievement worthy of the prestigious FA status. -- Rmrfstar 14:40, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

• Strong oppose, as per Cimon Avaro. This article verges on hagiography; it has been an uphill battle to get even the tiniest amount of negative material into the article, so as to provide even a modicum of balance. Even now, any source which says the slightest negative thing about Luther is downgraded or denigrated in some way, e.g. , and attempts are made to remove their words altogether, based on clearly false policy claims, e.g. , while falsely pumping up the credentials of Lutheran theologians who support Luther, e.g. . In this case, attempts are made to pump up the qualifications of Luther supporter Uwe Siemon-Netto, a journalist and theologian who did a PhD in sociology, to make them appear equivalent to that of critical historians such as Robert Michael, Professor Emeritus of European History at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, who in 1997 received the American Historical Associations James Harvey Robinson Prize for the most outstanding contribution to the teaching and learning of history, and Paul Johnson, who has written 16 works of history, many of them best-sellers. Jayjg 21:58, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Comment: This can be seen two ways, Jay. It appears from this side as an attempt to downgrade scholars who have done doctoral level work, studied Martin Luther and his works in-depth and deserve to be accorded respect. Instead, it appears they are attacked because they do not have the "correct" opinion on a single issue. In this article, a Catholic scholar was even questioned, apparently because he said something nice about Martin Luther. I would rather simply accept all of the scholars mentioned on that issue, introduce them neutrally and let the reader decide. This has been said repeatedly. The comments about Johnson and Michael were stated only show where things go when the qualifications of credentialed scholars are questioned. But it appears that others do not wish it to be so.

You and others are welcome to introduce other negative characteristics of Luther's legacy. The reason this has not been done is that the Luther and the Jews issue is constantly raised and efforts made to represent only one side of the debates involved. The article is incomplete in many respects because so many Bytes have been taken up on it. I'd urge neutral editors to read several encyclopedia articles to see how they portray the man, what is included and what is not. I suspect you will find little different from what is included in such essays and what we have placed here. --CTSWyneken 23:39, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Isn't the judgment as to sources generally based on whether they are in peer reviewed journals or published by reputable presses, preferrably academic? I think the article would be better off without detailed description of the qualifications of any source; if qualifications beyond the publisher or journal are needed to lend credibility, another source should be found. Sam 03:29, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

To comment on the academic titles: elsewhere we routinely remove PBUH and honorifics. In science we shouldn't need browbeating with academic titles, and if we want to convince the audience that someone's views are valid we present evidence that they are widely accepted. Dr Zak 04:02, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Object per Cimon Avaro and Jayjg. I'm surprised to see this nomination. Martin Luther has been the subject of some of the most POV editing I've witnessed in the 20 months I've been at Misplaced Pages. It has been edited largely by three employees of the Lutheran church — User:CTSWyneken, User:Drboisclair, and User:Ptmccain — who have fought hard to keep out or minimize any criticism of Luther, and there have been some serious attempts to bully editors who add criticism, with the result that the article can't be trusted to be a comprehensive description of Luther's life and work. Talk:Martin Luther and related talk pages became completely toxic, with endless, spurious arguments and wikilawyering about policies that none of them understood; Ptmccain e-mailed me with what he believed was my real name (based on what he read on an attack site) and then posted a reference to his e-mail on Talk:Martin Luther in an attempt to intimidate me ; the same user was blocked three times in 18 days for 3RR ; engaged in vandalism when thwarted ; and when I requested two citations for Martin Luther, he responded with a WP:POINT by going to articles I had created or edited and randomly requesting citations, including one for the sentence: "The terms extermination camp (German: Vernichtungslager) or death camp (German: Totenlager) specifically refer to the camps whose primary function was genocide." There's a lot more of the same behavior, but these highlights are examples of their response to the insertion of criticism.

Even today, as this nomination is being considered, Ptmccain and CTSWyneken are coooperating to stop historians Robert Michael and Paul Johnson from being called by their normal titles unless their favorite source, a Lutheran writer called Uwe Siemon-Netto, who works with these users, is called a historian too. But Siemon-Netto is a journalist who took a degree in theology or sociology and who now, like them, works for the Lutheran church. He has no degrees in history, has never published any history, and there are no credible third-party sources who say he's a historian. Even his own Misplaced Pages article, which was written by CTSWyneken, doesn't call him a historian. Ptmccain deleted that Robert Michael, who is very critical of Luther, is "Professor Emeritus of European History at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth," and reduced it to "historian," and Paul Johnson, who has published 16 works of history, many of them bestsellers, was downgraded from "historian" to "journalist" (which he also is), with the edit summary "shorter and more accurate descriptions of people." CTSWyneken is engaged in similar editing.

As for the article itself, it contains sentences like: " insisted that the impious and even beasts eating and drinking the consecrated elements eat and drink the body and blood of Christ, but the "unworthy" eat and drink it to their judgment," which is meaningless. The text is full of that kind of writing, but they won't allow it to be copy edited. SlimVirgin 03:37, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

With respect, Slim, I believe that you are being unfair here to make a judgment on Christian theology by calling it meaningless. This is the clear teaching of the New Testament that is being spoken of here about the eating and drinking of the body and blood of Christ. I do not think that you would take it too kindly if we were to comment on teachings of the Talmud in an uninformed way.--Drboisclair 01:21, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

It was not the religious aspect that I described as meaningless, Drb, and I apologize for giving that impression. It is the writing. Perhaps it's a quote, but then it needs to be in quotation marks. In the absence of those, I have to assume it was written by a Wikipedian, and if so, I have trouble working out what it means exactly, and I have to guess how it should be parsed. SlimVirgin 01:26, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Comment: Dear Slim: I'd appreciate civility from you. What has my status or those of other editors have to do with the article?

It would help the article if you would, rather than attack, compare the article against encyclopedia articles and provide tell us: what is covered in them that is not covered in our article? What is in our article that is not in them? If something is not in our article, then, please make a case for including it. --CTSWyneken 23:03, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

My comment was civil. Featured articles are supposed to be "well written, comprehensive, factually accurate, neutral, and stable," according to the FAC page. (a) The article isn't well written. I gave an example above. (b) It isn't comprehensive, as someone pointed out earlier: you've left out, for example, how crude Luther was, and he is famous for it. (c) I can't trust the factual accuracy because I've watched you try to keep out any criticism. (d) Ditto for neutral. (e) It isn't stable. You're edit warring on it even now so that Paul Johnson isn't called a "historian," despite his 16 published history books, but so that your source, Uwe Siemon-Netto is called one — someone who works with you, has written no works of history, has no degree in history, is not called a historian by a single third-party source that we can find (except of course Misplaced Pages, because you added it to the article), and who doesn't even call himself a historian. And Ptmccain has just been reported for his fourth 3RR violation on that page. SlimVirgin 00:16, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

First of all, attacking me and others is not civil, no matter what you think of us. Second, you have a right to your opinion on the fitness of the article for feature status. Third, I have to date not found an encyclopedia article that mentions that Luther was crude -- or others from his time for that matter. Fourth, Uwe Siemon-Netto does not work with me at all. He works at Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, not Fort Wayne. I have never met the man. You are also attacking a scholar you do not know and have not noticed that we have quoted from a book of history written by him. Also notice that I did not add the title "historian" to the Siemon-Netto article. Please check your facts. Fifth, if you do not trust the accuracy of the article, why not compare it to an encyclopedia article. You added a citation to the article from one. In fact, every fact tag you placed in the article I have tracked down a source for. You are welcome to check these, too.

You may have the last word now, because the only way we can move on is if I do not reply. So, please, live up to your own standards. --CTSWyneken 00:31, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

CTSWyneken, by "status", do you mean employment? As in, when you explained in On the Jews and Their Lies (on 04:01, 14 June 2006 UTC) that your full time paid "position" within the Lutheran Church included writing Misplaced Pages articles related to Martin Luther?--Doright 00:51, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

This does seem to require an explanation. CTSWyneken wrote: "For your information, in any case, my position is tasked with the generation of electronic resources, which does take in projects such as wikipedia." It appears to imply that editing Misplaced Pages is regarded as part of CTSW's job. SlimVirgin 01:07, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

CTS, why must you find another encyclopedia article that says he was crude? You know he was extraordinarily crude. There are good sources for it. It's a very interesting aspect of the man, and makes him come alive, in fact. But you are censoring it, calling it "not necessary." (Your problem is that you want to defend him, and therefore see the charge of being crude as criticism, but it really isn't. It makes him human and it would probably be the most interesting section on the page.) I didn't say you had added the word "historian" to Netto's page. I said even his own article doesn't say that about him, and he doesn't self-describe as one either. But you have added it to other articles, even though no sources back you up. The behavior of the main editors on the page is directly relevant to whether this article can be regarded as comprehensive, factually accurate, and neutral, which is why I've described it. SlimVirgin 00:56, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose, but emphatically not per Cimon Avaro, Jayjg and SlimVirgin. Much has been made of Luther's antisemitism. Admittedly I'm a simple chemist and a total layman. Wikipedians should be used to defending their views against laymen. The article devotes one paragraph to the development of Luther's views of the Jews and three his late work On the Jews and their Lies. This seems out of proportion. We should see the development of Luther's view on the subject, the reception of of his views by his contemporaries, and how his views fit into the context of antijudaism in the Late Middle Ages. This must include "On the Jews". de.wikipedia has a much more balanced view. Dr Zak 04:02, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Comment: I've checked two encyclopedia articles, one in Collier's, the other in Funk and Wagnalls. The former does not take up Luther's relationship to the Jews at all, the latter makes a two sentence mention. I am not against the longer treatment in the later article, but have opposed the paragraph in the intro. It is there at the insistance of SlimVirgin, JayG, Doright and others. --CTSWyneken 23:03, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose per Cimon avaro, Andreas Werle, Jayjg, SlimVirgin, and Dr Zak.--Doright 22:40, 27 June 2006 (UTC)