Wikipedia:Peer review/Christian ethics/archive1

Peer review

I've listed this article for peer review because I have just completed a total overhaul of this article and would eventually like to see it become a Good Article. I will appreciate any and all suggestions or comments made in good faith, but I will be especially grateful for a source review.

Thanks, Jenhawk777 (talk) 22:50, 19 January 2021 (UTC)

Ovinus

Here are some thoughts after reading the lead:

• Christian ethics, also called Moral theology, was a branch of theology for most of its history I think we need to be a bit simpler here. What is Christian ethics exactly? The lead should probably be like Christian ethics, also called Moral theology, is the study of .... It was a branch of theology for most of its history, but separated...
• which focuses on the building of an ethical character and what kind of person we ought to be, and a deontological ethic, which assesses choices and what we ought to do. In general we avoid we because it sounds prescriptivist. I'm ambivalent about the emphasis on the "be" and "do". I don't know if it really helps the reader because it's more vague than the distinction between ethical character and assessment of choices. Open to your thoughts on this.
• Since the Bible is the foundation of Christian ethics, and the Bible has a variety of ethical perspectives, there has been disagreement over the basic ethical principles of Christian ethics from its beginnings with seven of them requiring perennial reinterpretation. I'd suggest "The wide variety of biblical ethical perspectives has led to continued disagreement over the basic Christian ethical principles, with seven of them undergoing perennial debate." I think the word "requiring" and "reinterpretation" make it sound like the principles are demanding us to look back at them and reevaluate them.
  • Question: Is it literally seven? Surely there are other, lesser principles that are often debated?
• The Christian ethical system is applied to every area of life By whom? By all Christians? I'd suggest this: The Christian ethical system concerns all areas of life.

I'll get to more later! Ovinus (talk) 14:00, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

• • Ovinus Well, I have to say I hope you do, because these were all good suggestions, and I applied them all. I am sorry it took so long to get back to you here. RL interfered, but I should be okay to do this for a bit. Thank you again! Jenhawk777 (talk) 16:29, 22 January 2021 (UTC)

I'm back! I think we still need to be more explicit in the very first sentence. Christian ethics ... is both a virtue ethic ... and a deontological ethic? This construction is a bit confusing because it's using "ethic", already a pretty abstract term, in two ways, plural and singular. Also, I didn't know what a virtue or deontological ethic is, which makes me think it should be put in the second sentence. Ik Christian ethics is probably hard to define, but I'm looking for something like "Christian ethics, also called moral theology, is an ethical system and academic discipline based on the Bible." It may involve some imprecision or drawing the line on what constitutes Christian ethics. Ovinus (talk) 20:33, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

• • • Good!
    • This "Christian ethics, also called moral theology, is an ethical system and academic discipline based on the Bible." would be an inaccurate oversimplification. It is not just based on the Bible as the definition section shows, so I can't say that.
    • I didn't know what a virtue or deontological ethic is, Please see your second point above^^^^!! You said the explanation I included wasn't helpful and was vague. So which is it - in or out? Jenhawk777 (talk) 04:46, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

Definition and Sources

A really well-written section that brought a lot of clarity for me. Some questions (sorry for the deluge of these) and ideas:

• Theologian Emil Brunner makes it a point to differentiate Christian ethics could just be ... Brunner differentiates Christian ethics from ...
  • Sure.
• That would be a kind of legalism that is contrary to Christian ethics. Why exactly is it contrary? Because legalism clashes with the idea that ethics should come organically through dialectic? Because Christian ethics is often a deeply personal thing? Explicitness would help here
  • So this is an example of someone in the field assuming everyone else knows something they take for granted. My bad, and thank you for catching that. The Christian ethical system is a system based on grace not law. I will add that.
• This includes morality that arises from natural law and human nature What is "this" referring to here?
  • The sentence immediately before it about grace. Grace includes blah blah. I combined them for greater clarity. flipped stuff around
• Christian experience What do you mean by Christian experience? The experience of traveling through and making sense of the world from a Christian perspective? A narrower experience of attending church groups and the like?
  • The Christian experience of encountering God, being born again, all that stuff that is generally referred to as the Christian experience, so, more jargon on my part huh? Got it. Clarity coming...
• earlier philosophers Earlier than Plato or earlier than Christian scholars? I'd just say "early philosophers" or just "and others".
  • Yes earlier than Plato, I tried adding that. I'm not sure it works. But at least it is what the source says!
  • This is not a deluge, this is barely a dribble! :-) Thank you!! Jenhawk777 (talk) 05:11, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

Historical background

• Early Christian writings Maybe this should be the start of a new paragraph?
  • Okay.
• practical application I think "more practical application" would be better here, because it implies that sophisticated ethical analysis is impractical
  • Okay, I changed it a bit.
• as Christian ethics sought "moral instruction on specific problems and practices" How does this imply that the Roman empire had a hostile social setting?
  • Okay, I hope I explained better now
• until around the 1200s Is this necessary? I think we can just give a rough start and end date and shorten the quote to exclude the "most of the Middle Ages" part
  • GA and FA reviewers always want specific dates and time frames. "Most of the middle ages" would be too vague to get past them, so in the spirit of wanting some rating for this article, yes I think it's necessary.

• • Thank you! Your comments always cause me to up my game. I appreciate it. Jenhawk777 (talk) 23:00, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

Buidhe

A couple points here:

• Technically, you aren't supposed to have GA nominee and Peer review open at the same time.
• The biggest problem I see with the article's style is random sprinkling of unattributed, one-sentence quotes like "The moral, doctrinal and disciplinary results of the Council of Trent laid the foundations for Roman Catholic policies and thought right up to the present". All quotes, if used, should be attributed to the person who wrote them, as in, "Theologian Foo Bar stated... " However, the vast majority of these quotations should be paraphrased. (t · c) buidhe 05:17, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

Hi buidhe. Technically, this was supposed to have been closed January 27th before applying for GA - at least I thought it was. I don't know how this is still here with you able to post on it. I clearly did something wrong. I will figure it out and get it closed.

I left as much of the previous author's content as possible without always checking his sources. I was trying to be nice. He had a difficult time accepting the rewrite. That's my bad. I will fix those. Thank you! Jenhawk777 (talk) 07:50, 12 February 2021 (UTC)