Talk:Election of Uthman

The article as it stands is a copyvio. It's copied from [1]. I'm going to delete it and replace it with a stub. Zora 07:01, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Done!

Rewritten. I should be cleaning house. Zora 07:34, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Shia view

At the moment the article only represents the Sunni view. I will soon edit the shia view using Nahj al Balagha as a reference. --Khalid! 10:31, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

I've rewritten to make it clear what is Madelung's account and what is the Shi'a account. The Shi'a account is undeveloped and needs references.

You shouldn't just dismiss Madelung out of hand as "the Sunni account". He's spent his whole career studying Shi'a and of all the secular, academic historians, he's the one most sympathetic to the Shi'a. I'm not sure what the Sunni account of the matter would look like, but I suspect that it would differ in some crucial aspects from Madelung's account. Zora 22:02, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

The only reason i added ..."according to sunni's" was to prevent confusion that Shia's accept that Ali gave baya to Uthman. But I'm ok with the current version as it clearly shows the differnces.--Khalid! 13:35, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

References

An anon has been adding stuff to the article without references. For the Tabari cite, we need page number from the SUNY multi-volume English edition, since that's the one that readers would be consulting. The Glubb should go in the references section.

The anon added one bit re Umar's policies that had nothing to do with the election; I removed it. Zora 22:28, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

Withdrawing of Talha in favor of Uthman

As Talha was absent during election procedures and he came to Madina only after after Uthman was elected by Shura, so how could he have withdrew in favor of Uthman? It was Sa´d indeed who withdrew in favor of Uthman.--Ubed junejo (talk) 23:57, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

In need of improvements

I'm hoping to clean up and improve this article in the coming weeks. Suyuti and Tabari and Nahjul Balagha are primary sources that can be easily avoided with the wealth of secondary sources about Muhammad's succession. I'm also not sure if there is a need for separate Sunni and Shia sections once the unsourced content and primary sources are replaced or rewritten. Albertatiran (talk) 14:24, 7 October 2021 (UTC)

For the Sunni and Shia sections, where possible, I'd like to remove the primary sources. Setting aside the perhaps unnecessary direct quotes from primary sources, I think the new Proceedings section covers everything in the Sunni section and much of what's in the Shia section with modern sources. Albertatiran (talk) 17:30, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

@Al-Saaba: Could you please also add the page number for "The Early Islamic Conquests"? Thanks. Albertatiran (talk) 18:28, 21 October 2021 (UTC)

"Moral degradation"

"Uthman's reign as the third caliph was marked with widespread nepotism and moral degradation." That's an opinion and not a fact, and all the citations are of a single book. This needs to be removed or expanded upon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.219.255.13 (talk) 04:45, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

it also doesn't distinguish between the first and second halves of his reign. I agree with the user this should be removed. 2001:1970:5163:1200:0:0:0:DD20 (talk) 18:26, 5 July 2022 (UTC)

In the next few days, I'll hopefully make more precise the accusations in these sources against Uthman, particularly in the works of Madelung and Momen, and maybe new ones, e.g., Donner. Not sure what the OP means by "all the citations are of a single book." As far as I remember, Madelung concludes that there wasn't much of a difference between the first and second halves of Uthman's reign when it comes to corruption. A more detailed discussion would likely be out of the scope of this short section. I might also try to change the title of the section to something else... Albertatiran (talk) 18:48, 5 July 2022 (UTC)

Made some minor edits for now until a more careful revision in the next couple of months. (In particular, gave a more specific attribution and removed "moral degradation" for the time being though these accusations appear in Momen and Abbas.) Albertatiran (talk) 11:56, 16 July 2022 (UTC)

Hi Albertatiran, I see that you often add in-text attribution for things coming from expert scholars ('according to Madelung', etc.). However, did you know that our NPOV policy explicitly warns that we should avoid stating facts as opinions? See WP:YESPOV: Avoid stating facts as opinions. Uncontested and uncontroversial factual assertions made by reliable sources should normally be directly stated in Wikipedia's voice. Unless a topic specifically deals with a disagreement over otherwise uncontested information, there is no need for specific attribution for the assertion, although it is helpful to add a reference link to the source in support of verifiability. Further, the passage should not be worded in any way that makes it appear to be contested. If it's uncontested among scholars, it doesn't matter how controversial it may be among the general public (and that includes people complaining at talk pages!): we state the scholarly POV without in-text attribution.

If it is a matter of tone (the connotation of expressions like 'moral degradation') and it's only one source doing it, a better option is just to leave it out entirely, or reword it with a less pejorative connotation. This is also mandated by WP:YESPOV: Prefer nonjudgmental language. A neutral point of view neither sympathizes with nor disparages its subject (or what reliable sources say about the subject), although this must sometimes be balanced against clarity. Present opinions and conflicting findings in a disinterested tone. Do not editorialize. [...]. Be careful, however, not to censor out scholarly POVs that may be controversial: if all reliable sources write about something in a certain way, we should too. Thanks for your work on these articles, ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 12:19, 16 July 2022 (UTC)

Thanks! I did not know most of this :) Albertatiran (talk) 14:10, 16 July 2022 (UTC)