The subject of this article is controversial and content may be in dispute. When updating the article, be bold, but not reckless. Feel free to try to improve the article, but don't take it personally if your changes are reversed; instead, use the talk page to discuss them. Content must be written from a neutral point of view. Include citations when adding content and consider tagging or removing unsourced information.
Bible is a former featured article candidate. Please view the links under Article milestones below to see why the nomination was archived. For older candidates, please check the archive.
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Bible, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the Bible on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.BibleWikipedia:WikiProject BibleTemplate:WikiProject BibleBible
Bible is within the scope of WikiProject Catholicism, an attempt to better organize and improve the quality of information in articles related to the Catholic Church. For more information, visit the project page.CatholicismWikipedia:WikiProject CatholicismTemplate:WikiProject CatholicismCatholicism
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Christianity, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Christianity on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ChristianityWikipedia:WikiProject ChristianityTemplate:WikiProject ChristianityChristianity
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Judaism, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Judaism-related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.JudaismWikipedia:WikiProject JudaismTemplate:WikiProject JudaismJudaism
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Religion, a project to improve Wikipedia's articles on Religion-related subjects. Please participate by editing the article, and help us assess and improve articles to good and 1.0 standards, or visit the wikiproject page for more details.ReligionWikipedia:WikiProject ReligionTemplate:WikiProject ReligionReligion
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Theology, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Theology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.TheologyWikipedia:WikiProject TheologyTemplate:WikiProject TheologyTheology
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Ancient Near East, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of ancient Near East–related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Ancient Near EastWikipedia:WikiProject Ancient Near EastTemplate:WikiProject Ancient Near EastAncient Near East
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Greece, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Greece on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.GreeceWikipedia:WikiProject GreeceTemplate:WikiProject GreeceGreece
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Religious texts, a project which is currently considered to be defunct.Religious textsWikipedia:WikiProject Religious textsTemplate:WikiProject Religious textsReligious texts
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Anthropology, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Anthropology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.AnthropologyWikipedia:WikiProject AnthropologyTemplate:WikiProject AnthropologyAnthropology
This article was selected as the article for improvement on 5 June 2023 for a period of one week.
How should the lead describe how different faiths view the Bible, part II
Hi, I worked on this article some years ago and was recently asked to weigh in on the lead. I'm sorry it has taken me so long to answer, but I've been out of town and off-line for a while. I think the claim The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. makes it sound as if the whole Bible is equally important to Judaism and Christianity, which we all know is inaccurate. How about a period after The Bible is a collection of religious texts. Period. Then a new sentence that covers some of what was removed: "These texts are important, but aspects are viewed differently in Christianity, Judaism and Islam." or "These texts are important in Christianity, Judaism and Islam, but not equally nor the same parts." which is a little awkward but conveys that the different religions place different value on them and on different aspects of them - some such thing should be said. It's misleading as it is now. Jenhawk777 (talk) 20:00, 7 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That's why "partly" existed but people voted to remove it, and I personally believe the religions should be mentioned in the first sentence. I got an Idea hold on. GloryToCalifornia (talk) 20:57, 7 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Let's just go with "The Bible is a collection of religious texts, some, all, or a variant of which are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam." Sound good? If that sounds good go ahead and add it I'm too lazy. If it doesn't tell me and I'll come up with another idea GloryToCalifornia (talk) 21:04, 7 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Jenhawk! There are certainly several ways to skin this particular cat, and several things one wants to accomplish at the same time.
My reading of "The collection of materials accepted as part of the Bible by a particular religious tradition or community is called a biblical canon." is that, say, the KJV and the Hebrew bible are both "The Bible" in this context, so "central to Judaism" works for me here, I don't read it as a contradiction, one just has to read more of the WP:LEAD. To cherry-pick a quote from Bible by John Barton: "The Bible is centrally important to both Judaism and Christianity ..." If there is a difference in the weight Judaism and Christianity put on their respective bibles, I have no opinion on that. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 07:11, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We could perhaps rearrange the paragraph like so:
The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The collection of materials accepted as part of the Bible by a particular religious tradition or community is called a biblical canon. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Koine Greek. The texts include instructions, stories, poetry, prophecies, and other genres. Believers generally consider it to be a product of divine inspiration, but the way they understand what that means and interpret the text varies.
Gråbergs Gråa Sång The problem not addressed here is that the entire Bible is not important to Judaism, and this says it is. The New Testament has no place in Judaism, nor is the entire Bible important as anything but a quaint anomaly for Islam. GloryToCalifornia Why is it necessary to mention these three in the first sentence? The Bible is not equally central to these separate religions. Trying to make a statement that embraces them all, yet leaves others out completely, is the source of the problem. Jenhawk777 (talk) 17:09, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That's not how I read it. The Bible central to Judaism is the Bible Judaism accepts as Bible, and the paragraph deals with that, taken as a whole. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:24, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Quoting @LWG from the thread above, "However the way the article is currently written "Bible" could refer to any of several different canons, including the Hebrew Bible which excludes the NT. As currently written it is most correct to say that the Bible is sacred and foundational in Christianity, Judaism, and probably Samaritanism. All three of those groups believe that "the Bible" is fully sacred, not sacred in part, they just disagree on what "the Bible" is."Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:35, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
On having "...and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam." in the first sentence, that looks fine to me, the other Abrahamics should be mentioned early. Doesn't have to be first sentence, but it doesn't bother me, Islam is biggest of the other Abrahamics mentioned in the article. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:44, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
LWG is wrong and I debunked his arguments like several of times. This is annoying I'm just going to go with the thing I proposed everyone ignored. Scroll up on this thread to see what is was if you didn't see it GloryToCalifornia (talk) 17:54, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I rolled back that change, not because you are necessarily wrong, but because we should wait for agreement of multiple people on this, and because the text that resulted was ungrammatical. -- LWGtalk21:35, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
To the main question here: I agree with GloryToCalifornia that if this subject if this article is supposed to be the Catholic Bible only, then we shouldn't say that the whole Bible is foundational to Judaism, since they don't accept all of the Christian canon. But if we want to re-scope this article to only cover the Christian canon, we need to edit it a lot, because right now that's not how the article is written. Until we do, the lead should reflect the scope that the article does, which includes the various collections that Jews call "the Bible". Personally I think the most sensible thing to do is to keep the broad scope here and let articles like Catholic Bible, Hebrew Bible, Biblical canon etc cover the narrow scopes. It's not a hill I want to die on - if the general consensus here is something else so be it. -- LWGtalk21:35, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
So are we going to keep the page the way it is then? Might as well. We spent days and hours and hours to achieve consensus, just to start over in one day. And once again I personally think Christianity should be mentioned first. It's the religion most associated with the word Bible. If you look up the word "Bible" on Google, Google gives a definition that says it's "Christian scriptures". If you ask a random person "what religion is associated with the Bible" I'm 95% sure they would say "Christianity". I mean it's common sense, plus you seem like the only person who wants to add Judaism first. GloryToCalifornia (talk) 05:34, 9 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Gråbergs Gråa Sång I'm sorry my friend, you know I deeply respect and appreciate you but your response above That's not how I read it. is problematic. Your opinion is not the deciding factor - WP standards are. WP states plainly (quotes are mine) If interpretation "could be" ambiguous, use links "or rewording" to make it clearer. If anyone could ever read that sentence as ambiguous - whether you personally do so or not - then it's a bad sentence. It can be misinterpreted, even if not by you, therefore it needs rewording. There is no real debate possible on that particular point. WP standards must be the deciding factor.
The rest of your comment is also problematic - and kind of proves the point here. The Bible central to Judaism is the Bible Judaism accepts as Bible, and the paragraph deals with that, "taken as a whole." If the reader has to read the entire paragraph to figure out what the first sentence means, that's pretty much a give-away it's lacking clarity. Wikipedia:Basic copyeditinginvolves the "five Cs": making the article clear... effective writing is clear.... Just give on this one. The sentence is not worth fighting to keep.
LWG I agree with you, the scope of the article should be kept. I don't think anyone has disagreed, so there is consensus on that one point.
GloryToCalifornia I agree with you about listing Christianity first as the most associated with the term Bible. And you are the only other editor here, so far, who has acknowledged that seeing only part of it as sacred is necessary to include, so kudos there as well. However, none of the suggested changes are genuine improvements - yet. I object to your artificial requirement that the three religions be included in the first sentence. This is not an article about them, it's about the Bible. That focus should be clear, and mentioning the religions later, rather than sooner, allows that. Even if you disagree, I ask for a good-faith compromise on this particular issue. That would go a long way toward resolving this.
Since one of the five "Cs" is "concise", I tend to like short, to the point, sentences like "The Bible is a collection of religious texts." But if no one else agrees that is a sufficient opening sentence, then combining it with the next sentence makes the most sense:
The Bible is a collection of religious texts developed over time as an anthology (a compilation of texts in a variety of forms) originally written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Koine Greek. Divided into the Old and the New Testaments, the Bible includes instructions, stories, poetry, prophecies, and other genres. Both Testaments of the Bible are central to Christianity which generally describes it as divinely inspired. Judaism only recognizes the Old Testament as sacred. Islam states the Bible was once divinely inspired but is currently corrupted. Other faiths, such as the Bahai and the Rastafarian faiths, also see the Bible as sacred.
Because if we mention one faith we need to mention them all for neutrality. This has the Bible's primary characteristics - including the two testaments which should be there and weren't - and it includes the differing views by the different faiths - later not sooner. If anyone does not like this approach, adjustments can be made, but please be prepared to offer some good reasons why. Otherwise, we should make the changes and be done. This has gone on way too long. Jenhawk777 (talk) 04:18, 10 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Likewise! I'll copy the current first paragraph here for comparison.
The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The collection of materials accepted as part of the Bible by a particular religious tradition or community is called a biblical canon. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Koine Greek. The texts include instructions, stories, poetry, prophecies, and other genres. Believers generally consider it to be a product of divine inspiration, but the way they understand what that means and interpret the text varies.
Consensus will be what it will be, I know that "That's not how I read it" is not the deciding factor, I was stating my opinion on the article text, and I consider it a reasonable one. To me, your version of the first paragraph seems Christian-centric with the "Both Testaments of the Bible", "Judaism only recognizes the Old Testament..." (my emphasis and link). My reading (again) is that you're making the Christian Bible the Bible, and that is not the approach of this article, but there are absolutely biblical canons with two testaments. We don't need to mention all faiths per WP:LEAD (for the rest of the article there is WP:PROPORTION, WP:DUE etc. WP:NPOV and "neutrality" can often be seen as wildely different). Baháʼí Faith isn't mentioned in the article at all, that's a major WP:LEAD-fail, and IMO it's clear Rastafarianism doesn't fit per WP:LEAD either. If people want to strike "such as Islam", fine, but it does have some article content. It is strange to me to remove biblical canon from the lead, a lot of the content in the article relates to that.
On "If the reader has to read the entire paragraph to figure out what the first sentence means, that's pretty much a give-away it's lacking clarity.", I don't think that works as guide in general, we can never put everything in one sentence, but of course as Wikipedians we'll spend time on discussing, well, anything, it's what we do. Going very WP:OTHERCONTENT for an example, "The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of Africans enslaved in the United States." is only the third sentence at African Americans, and that has been debated for years per ADOS views etc. From where I'm sitting, "The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The collection of materials accepted as part of the Bible by a particular religious tradition or community is called a biblical canon." is clear enough for that particular piece of text. It's two sentences of a long (!) article with plenty of detail. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 05:59, 10 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Let me get this straight. @Gråbergs Gråa Sång can use an example of a Wikipedia page, the page on African Americans, but when I was using an example for how this article should be, the page on Quran, he said I'm not allowed to do that because it violates WP:OTHERCONTENT. It's either all okay or none of it is okay GloryToCalifornia (talk) 17:32, 10 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't say you couldn't, I said it's rarely a good argument. If you read WP:OTHERCONTENT, you'll see you can't really "violate" it since it suggests "is generally unconvincing". Your Quran argument may have been convincing. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 19:48, 10 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
For clarity: I was notified about this via a WikiProject post and didn't read the whole chain. I read the most recent suggestions (GGS's above) and it looked pretty reasonable to me. If you think this is wrong, you should write your own draft and start an RFC. Don't let one (uninformed) comment dissuade your desire to improve content. — ImaginesTigers (talk) 17:56, 10 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, I didn't read any comments you know. hi there, have a great day. Don't blame me, I don't know what I'm doing 🤷 ⟨⟨Beastboy-𝕏-Talk!⟩⟩23:19, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Really? Not trying to be bad but Really? I don't know, maybe I'm wrong but listen up!, One Bible does not belong to
ifferent religions, I don't know I your country, but In my country, it's a sin to touch a Christian Bible (Holy Bible) if you are a Muslim, you will be greatly punished for that, if you leave Islam and go to other religions, they will kill you. This article needs to be split into three articles: Holy Bible, Islam Bible and Judaism Bible. These Bibles are totally different, Islam says there is no Jesus but Christians say there is, Even Christian stands for Christ like Character. ⟨⟨Beastboy-𝕏-Talk!⟩⟩23:16, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
literally everything you said is false. Muslims believe Jesus to be the Messiah but they don't believe he died on the Cross, they just believe he was a prophet of Allah like Muhammad. Also secondly this article is split. There's a Wikipedia article about the Catholic Bible, Muslim interpretations on the Bible and how they view it to be corrupted over time, the Protestant Bible and the old testament which only Jews believe in GloryToCalifornia (talk) 23:27, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
OK, I'm a SDA Christian and I know all about it and I'm a child so I'm really sturborn so yeah, whatever!. Anyway, if it's the same Bible, they know that they believe in lies that the keepers told people:
Matthew 28:13 (KJV) Saying, Say ye, His disciples came by night, and stole him away while we slept.
Matthew 28:15 (KJV) So they took the money, and did as they were taught: and this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day.
I'm deeply sorry (But I an't wrong) if this offend you or anyone else, please forgive me 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺. Have a great day and happy editing!🥰🥰🥰.
Not done: Adequate before, given resurrection would be included in life, and arguably crucifixion in his teachings. Also, this wouldn't technically be very accurate, given the authentic early witnesses we have of Mark do not depict the resurrection, but only mention it briefly and ambiguously, as the text ends with Mark 16. Remsense 🌈 论14:15, 6 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A request to any contributor to this article.....
Hello. I hope someone can help. I myself am not able to edit or contribute to this article, because right now I just have an IP address. And the page is protected. I was wondering if someone out there who is pretty good in collating, contributing, editing, and adding, to this article or general, can add this little piece of information which is interesting and arguably important, to the article. A point which I think is useful and even necessary. And I was a little surprised that it's not there already. Because this is a long and comprehensive article for this important subject matter. And it goes into quite a bit. I was looking in this article for the phrase "Divine Library", which Jerome referred the Bible as being, or in Latin "Bibliotheca Divina". I double-checked. I couldn't find it.
The Bible was first referred to as the "Divine Library" (Bibliotheca Divina) by Jerome in the fourth century A D., while he was working on his Latin Vulgate of the Bible. This term highlights the understanding that the Bible is a collection and catalogue of various books and writings (or biblia in Greek) that together comprise a unified, divinely inspired message. It emphasizes the inherent unity within the diverse collection of books of the Prophets and Apostles. Thank you. I appreciate any help. Regards.
Would seem like a fine point to mention off-hand on Jerome's own article, or on some more focused article, but I have really no idea why it rises to that level of importance in this very broad article, save the fact that we like it. Remsense 🌈 论02:42, 5 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Well there are other fine points mentioned in this Bible article (so it's a matter of consistency), such as copious things regarding Jerome and statements he said regarding his opinions on the Greek Septuagint and the Greek-translated Book of Daniel, etc, that could arguably also be said to belong only on the Jerome article. Yet it's included here too.
So the Divine Library point, about the Bible is actually a collection and collation and catalog of various books combined into one volume, calling it the Divine Library, is arguably an important or useful point that Jerome mentioned while he was working on his Latin Vulgate Bible.
And also, as I said, this Bible article goes into things about him producing the Latin Vulgate translation. So it would only be fitting in this article also. Not just in the Jerome article. Because your argument is not consistent if that's the case.
Other things are included in this article Bible, that others could say are somewhat kind of trivial or maybe somewhat unnecessary too for this specific article. Or not of mounting importance necessarily.
In this Bible article, it mentions Jerome talking about the Septuagint and the Book of Daniel.
Why is his opinion of that Septuagint matter so necessarily important to include here? If that's the case. Someone could easily say that that's not that vital or necessary to this article also, yet it was included. We read…..
The priest Jerome, in his preface to Daniel (407 CE), records the rejection of the Septuagint version of that book in Christian usage: "I ... wish to emphasize to the reader the fact that it was not according to the Septuagint version but according to the version of Theodotion himself that the churches publicly read Daniel." Jerome's preface also mentions that the Hexapla had notations in it, indicating several major differences in content between the Theodotion Daniel and the earlier versions in Greek and Hebrew.
Given all these facts and points, there's no valid reason NOT to include a simple brief thing, in the paragraphs that mentioned Jerome in this Bible article, while it was working on the Latin Vulgate translation, that he referred to the Bible as “Bibliotheca Divina”. Divine Library.
It goes beyond “we like”. This is a notable point said by Jerome, that's been known and mentioned historically, and appreciated for a while. Regarding the BIBLE. Not just a Jerome thing.
And if the other Jerome stuff is in this Bible article, there's no real good reason why this can't be either.
@LWG
GM/GD God's grace in India and your blessings be with us, as always available at your assistance.
Happy Easter Sunday in advance.
May I know the reason for rejection? My sincere apologies for any disturbance, and we regret all inconveniences.
Thank you.
Yours faithfully.
Nandan M. Nandanmwikipedia (talk) 04:40, 4 April 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Hi @Nandanmwikipedia, your edit added an external link to the Encyclopedia Britanica article about the Bible, but we don't normally do external links to general reference works like that. Check out point number 1 at the shortcut WP:LINKSTOAVOID: the site should not merely repeat information that is already or should be in the article. In general, since I see you are adding a lot of external links to articles recently, it would be good for you to read WP:EL to see what kind of external links are helpful. External links that go against the guidance there will probably eventually be reverted, so adding them is a waste of time. Blessings! -- LWGtalk(VOPOV)22:45, 4 April 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I'm adding information that has values and key information as an example mentioned here, and it's not repeated information. I'm sincerely begging you to stop reverting unnecessarily.
@Twistybrastrap: Your edit at Bible was your first edit I noticed. Then I became curious what other edits you made. You are yourself not very verbose with writing edit summaries, so don't ask from me what you don't do yourself. tgeorgescu (talk) 23:24, 6 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I gave a perfectly reasonable explanation for my edit on this page. If you disagree, you should explain why instead of just reverting my edits and then stalking my user page to see what else you can revert. Twistybrastrap (talk) 23:30, 6 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Is the Bible really "the philosophical foundation of human rights"?
The Social responsibility section claims that The philosophical foundation of human rights is in the Bible's teachings of natural law. I can't access either of the provided sources (one costs 312 dollars!) but I'm struggling to find other sources for this extraordinary claim. Our article on human rights never mentions the Bible. Sophocrat (talk) 05:25, 13 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Actually at Human Rights#History we do have In the West, Jewish and Christian scriptures provided some conceptual foundations for discourse on rights along with Roman law providing legal foundations on what implementation may look like. and natural law also mentions the Bible quite a bit. Maybe check out the sources on those articles? I was able to pull up Imagining Human Rights on Google books, but the Google books copy doesn't have page numbers and I was unable to find this claim in the book. -- LWGtalk(VOPOV)16:18, 13 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
The NT gospels have something to do with human rights, but in a very indirect fashion. It's not like Jesus championed bourgeois liberties. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:03, 13 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Going over the provided sources, Kim says the precise opposite:
I deny in the first three chapters that we can derive human rights from Christian roots. But I’m also writing as a Christian, so in the historical-sociological parts, I would say, I have to ask myself the question: “Is there any evidence for the Christian roots?” My answer to that is: “There is no such root.” So I go on to say: when an interesting cultural innovation like the idea of the sacredness of the person comes up, all religious traditions, all secular-intellectual or political traditions, including the Christian one, somehow have to define their relationship to this cultural innovation. Hence, I try to describe that at a certain point those Christians who did not position themselves in opposition to human rights started to look for elements in the Christian tradition, elements that allowed them to say: “This is what we have always already wanted to say, but we were just not able to articulate it well enough.” And what they discovered are the two elements of the Christian, and partly also of the Jewish, tradition: first, human beings are created in the image of God; and second, we are the children of God. These are the two basic elements.
The best that that can be paraphrased to is that human rights are not completely antithetical to the Bible; it explicitly states in as many words that the author has concluded that human rights cannot be derived from Christian roots (!!) and even to the extent that it notes things that can support them it carefully applies them only to those Christians who did not position themselves in opposition to human rights. The other source doesn't even mention the Bible; it's perhaps not unreasonable to infer that the author would be sympathetic to the statement made here, but they don't go so far as to make it themselves. They say:
The philosophical foundations of the liberal conception of human rights can be found in natural law theories. From the Stoics to Cicero, from St. Thomas Aquinas to Hugo Grotius, these theories were based on the natural conditions of human existence. Particularly, the theory of natural rights, the offspring of the natural law theories, laid the foundations for the conception of human rights accepted by established or emerging liberal democratic regimes. In this regard, the most developed natural law theory was formulated by John Locke in the 17th century. According to Locke, men and women possessed certain natural rights in the state of nature which was a state of perfect freedom and a state of equality. These natural rights included the rights to life, liberty and property. The natural law stipulated that human beings should seek to preserve themselves as well as other human beings. The enforcement of the law of nature required an authority who would punish those encroaching it. Since everybody was equal in the state of nature, everybody was granted the right to punish or what Locke called the "Executive Power of the Law of Nature". This, however, creates certain inconveniences. Thus men and women organized themselves into a political community and created a common higher authority through a social contract in order to better protect their rights. They surrendered their natural powers to the state, but they retained their natural rights. According to Locke's theory, in the event that state authorities fail to protect the natural rights or they violate them, they would lose their legitimacy, thus their claim to obedience.14
Even what it says is IMHO dubious and if this were an article on natural law theories I'd probably dig for other sources, because that's just one-sided, but even if we take it at face value it simply doesn't support the statement here (it doesn't mention the bible at all, and while it mentions some Christian thinkers it also mentions pre-Christian ones who obviously were not drawing on the Bible.) I'm just going to remove it for now. If we wanted to replace it with something, a more cautiously-worded statement based on Kim would be something like Some Christians have found support in the bible for modern conceptions of human rights, though others have cited it to oppose them - but I'd really want to find better sources for both parts of that sentence, especially since the part of Kim we're citing is written in the first person as a sort of personal perspective regarding the author's own faith. But either way Kim is very very clear that the Bible is not the source of modern conceptions of human rights, and that modern-day Christians who look to it for that are approaching it with ideas they found elsewhere and looking for ideas or elements in the Bible that can support it, rather than deriving it from the text via first principles (Kim's "there is no root.") --Aquillion (talk) 21:44, 13 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
"From the Stoics to Cicero, from St. Thomas Aquinas to Hugo Grotius, these theories were based on the natural conditions of human existence." Well, Stoicism's concept of Nature has more to do with their beliefs in a universal sense of reason and ethics, rather than specific rights for humans. These are the guys that thought that slaves were equals to other humans: "Stoic ethics involves improving the individual's ethical and moral well-being: "Virtue consists in a will that is in agreement with Nature."[1] The foundation of Stoic ethics is that good lies in the state of the soul itself, in wisdom and self-control. For the Stoics, reason meant using logic and understanding the processes of nature—the logos or universal reason, inherent in all things, as a means of overcoming destructive emotions.[2] This principle also applies to the realm of interpersonal relationships; "to be free from anger, envy, and jealousy",[3] and even to accept slaves as equals of others because all are products of nature.[4]"Dimadick (talk) 08:58, 14 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
References
^Russell, Bertrand. A History of Western Philosophy, p. 254
For clarity's sake, the disputed article text here is "There is an absence of evidence for the presence of Israel in Egypt from any Egyptian source, historical or archaeological." This seems to be based on a similar sentence from Hoffmeier 1999, p. 53: "Indeed, no one has been able to identify any unimpeachable evidence in Egypt, either historical or archaeological, to support the biblical accounts of the sojourn and exodus events."
My general feeling about the date of sources is that there can't be an arbitrary hard line in a subject area. For particular topics within a subject area there may be rapid shifts in scholarly thinking (nobody should put any stock in an analysis of ancient Egyptian religion from before 1946, for example, or of Mithraism before 1971). But I know of no evidence that study of biblical history has shifted away from Hoffmeier's sentence since 1999, even though Hoffmeier himself clearly wishes it would.
If CycoMa2 insists on a 21st-century source, Grabbe 2017 reaches much the same conclusion, after summarizing all the possible evidence about the Exodus. From p. 93: "A number of Egyptian texts from the second millennium BCE mention peoples who were non-Egyptian and probably Semitic. The Egyptian texts refer to 'foreigners' under the category of 'Asiatics', Nubians and Libyans. None of the 'Asiatics' mentioned in Egyptian texts is referred to in such a way as to make one identify them with Israelites. What it does indicate is that the idea of people from Syro-Palestine – including possibly some early Israelites – living for a time in Egypt is not itself problematic." And from p. 97: "No Egyptian document, inscription, or piece of iconography depicts, describes, or refers to an exodus as described in the Bible. There are no Egyptian references of any kind that relate to Joseph, the descendants of Jacob, Moses, the ten plagues, or the exodus… It is even stranger that there is no early archaeology relating to the Israelites in the major areas of the exodus". A. Parrot (talk) 19:57, 14 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Content Disclaimer
Informasi ini disarikan dari Wikipedia dan disajikan kembali untuk tujuan edukasi. Konten tersedia di bawah lisensi CC BY-SA 3.0. Kami tidak bertanggung jawab atas ketidakakuratan data yang bersumber dari kontribusi publik tersebut.
The information displayed on this website is sourced in part or in whole from Wikipedia and has been adapted for the purpose of restating it. We strive to provide accurate and relevant information, however:
There is no guarantee of absolute accuracy. Wikipedia is an open, collaborative project that can be edited by anyone, so information is subject to change.
It is not intended to constitute professional advice. The content displayed is for informational and educational purposes only. For important decisions (e.g., medical, legal, or financial), please consult a professional.
Content copyright. Wikipedia is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License (CC BY-SA). This means that content may be reused with appropriate attribution and shared under a similar license.
Responsible use. Any risk arising from the use of information from this website is entirely the responsibility of the user.
level-3 vital article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.
,_early_1900s,_Central_Africa,_Democratic_Republic_of_the_Congo,_Pende_people,_wood,_fiber_-_Cleveland_Museum_of_Art_-_DSC08700.JPG){kind=small}
Not done: Adequate before, given resurrection would be included in life, and arguably crucifixion in his teachings. Also, this wouldn't technically be very accurate, given the authentic early witnesses we have of Mark do not depict the resurrection, but only mention it briefly and ambiguously, as the text ends with Mark 16. Remsense 🌈 论 14:15, 6 July 2025 (UTC)