Talk:Ghulat

Bohras

How are Bohra Ismāʿīlīs ghulat? Don't they have quite orthodox beliefs and practices? Kitabparast 15:23, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Middle Eastern standards

What is that? What does this term mean. Somehow it seems patronizing. --Maha Odeh (talk) 13:56, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it is VERY patronizing! This is just another Muslim Brotherhood propaganda article like so many other condescending articles on Islamic topics here on Wikipedia designed to insult non-Salafi sects. No oversight at all. 94.197.121.125 (talk) 12:02, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

The term has mainly used by Shi`is to refer to other Shi`is, as the article makes clear, so I don't know how Salafis enter in to it... AnonMoos (talk) 08:17, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

This article is mind-blowing

It blows my mind how this article is off-topic and I even couldn't understand what it is talking about? If the meaning of Ghulat is the same as the meaning in Arabic then this article is totally off-topic there is no group in Shia that is called Ghulat(the short description says they are a group of Shia) that's so bias although I am a Sunni I know this is so wrong. Also traditionally Abdullah Ibn Saba' is the first Ghulat? WTF!!!!!! I can say that the earliest Ghulat I know are the people of Noah. Also Christians are considered Ghulat in Islam. How is Abdullah Ibn Saba' the first Ghulat ((traditionally)) what tradition says this? I will need to rewrite this article--SharabSalam (talk) 02:32, 24 April 2019 (UTC)

Maybe the word can be used with many meanings in modern Arabic, but as a significant term in religious history, it was used by "mainstream" Shi`i (such as "twelvers") to refer to other groups they didn't want to be associated with... AnonMoos (talk) 09:55, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

September 2022 rewrite

I have rewritten this article from scratch today. The result is very incomplete and far from ideal, but still much better than the obscure and haphazardly sourced article that sat here before (new vs old). The section on 'Mother of the Book (Umm al-kitāb)' was copied from Umm al-kitab (Shi'i book), the sections 'Book of the Seven and the Shadows (Kitāb al-Haft wa-l-aẓilla)' and 'Book of the Path (Kitāb al-Ṣirāṭ)' were copied from al-Mufaddal ibn Umar al-Ju'fi, all with some minor copy-editing. For attribution, see the history of those pages.

Ovbiously, the article at this time is extremely uneven, with on the one hand a stubby lead that does not summarize the article but mentions some important facts not yet covered in the main body of the article, and on the other hand very elaborate 'Origins (680–700)', 'Ghulāt writings' and 'Bibliography' sections, with almost nothing in between. However, for each subsection the most relevant reliable sources are cited, so anyone who would be willing to expand will find the necessary sources right there.

Conveniently, many of these basic sources are Encyclopædia Iranica entries, which are available on the internet for everyone to read (just click the links). I would strongly recommend starting with Halm 2001–2012's "Ḡolāt" article, which gives a chronological overview also followed here. Even by just using that one article the near-empty sections could be substantially filled by anyone who feels inclined to work on this. I personally do not plan to work on the article for some time, though I will likely come back to it at some point in the future. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 22:53, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

Use of "the prophet Muhhamad" and scare quotes for "exaggerated"

@UrielAcosta:: regarding [1][2][3][4]:

About the scare quotes, the article in Encyclopaedia Iranica starts as follows:

ḠOLĀT (lit.: exaggerators, sing. ḡāli), an Arabic term originally used by Twelver Shiʿite (eṯnā ʿašariya) heresiographers to designate those dissidents who “exaggerate” the status of the Imams [...]

Notice the use of the scare quotes, which are regularly used by reliable sources in this context for the reason I've given in my edit summary before. What policy ground is there here to not do something that reliable sources are doing?

As for the use of the word "prophet", the same Encyclopaedia Iranica article includes the sentence According to ʿAbd-Allāh b. Ḥarb’s doctrine, the prophet Moḥammad as well as ʿAli b. Abi Ṭāleb and his descendants, the Imams, were gods (āleha). This is a very common usage in reliable sources (e.g., [5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13]).

It is as I said especially appropriate to refer to Muhammad in his capacity as a prophet in the context of his veneration, simply because the very reason why Muslims venerated him is the fact that they regarded him as a prophet. It's what the ghulat believed, which we are reporting. Your reply seems to imply that writing about the ghulat's veneration of the prophet Muhammad in these terms would somehow amount to Wikipedia venerating the prophet. Now if it does, then all the reliable sources above are venerating the prophet too. It may be that from some editors' point of view, speaking about "the prophet Muhammad" instead of just "Muhammad" indeed is a type of veneration. Personally, and speaking as an atheist, I believe this to be a misunderstanding of the reason why reliable sources use such language. But what I or other editors believe is not relevant: WP:NPOV, which is a far more important policy than the MOS:PBUH guideline, dictates that we should follow reliable sources, regardless of our personal beliefs:

If a name is widely used in reliable sources (particularly those written in English) and is therefore likely to be well recognized by readers, it may be used even though some may regard it as biased.

Apart from that, MOS:PBUH currently states that recommended action is to use just Muhammad "except when it is the first reference in an article, or the first reference in the lead, in which case it may be rendered as "the Islamic prophet Muhammad" if necessary." We are discussing a first mention here. The reason why it is acceptable to use the word "prophet" at first mention is because it disambiguates: "Muhammad" is one of the most used names in the world, and especially in a historical Islamic context there are a ton of Muhammads. On the one hand, Muhammad's fuller name Muhammad ibn Abd Allah is never used (neither in historical primary sources nor in modern secondary sources), but on the other hand simply "Muhammad" is often ambiguous enough to warrant disambiguation. This is commonly done in reliable sources by speaking about "the prophet Muhammad", or simply "the prophet".

Based on WP:NPOV, Wikipedia should in fact be doing this too, and I've opened a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Islam-related articles to address this issue. ☿ Apaugasma (talk ☉) 17:12, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

"The only ghulāt sect still in existence"

The article says "The only ghulāt sect still in existence today are the Alawites"; but the Shabak and the Alevi are not also sometimes consider "ghulat"? MiguelMadeira (talk) 15:09, 3 November 2023 (UTC)