Template talk:Deuterocanonical books composition

Unsourced

@Nederlandse Leeuw: your template has no sources. If it remains unsourced after 7 days, I will start a discussion on the deletion of the template. Veverve (talk) 16:43, 4 January 2021 (UTC)
Moreover, do you plan to put this template on numerous articles? If not, I believe a template is useless. Veverve (talk) 16:44, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

@Veverve:, you were right to challenge me on the sources. I've worked for the past 24 hours to find RS for dates and languages, those are now all provided. It turns out that the English Wikipedia pages on these books cannot be taken at face value.

As to your second question, I had originally not yet thought of a place other than Deuterocanonical books#Overview to use them, but I'm now considering to also use them under Dating the Bible#Table III: Deuterocanonical Old Testament and Authorship of the Bible#Table III: Deuterocanonical Old Testament. The information there largely overlaps with what I've just gathered here, though it differs in places and sometimes has more information than I do. I think all three articles could benefit from a uniform template that gives readers the exact same information on the status of scholarly consensus on the dating, original language and authorship of all deuterocanonical books. That way Wikipedia doesn't contradict itself, provides a comprehensive simultaneous overview to the 3 origins questions of all these books combined, and any correction immediately corrects an error in all these pages simultaneously. What do you think about that? Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 15:59, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

@Nederlandse Leeuw: Good job on finding the sources soo quickly! I wanted to avoid a repetition of what happened with Template:Vulgate manuscripts: having an unsourced template used only in one article and which remained so for 12 years.

I agree that it is easier to have one template for numerous articles. You can post the template wherever you feel is appropriate; as long as this template is in at least 2 articles, the presence of a table as a template is justifiable as far as I am concerned. Veverve (talk) 16:13, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

@Veverve: thank you! I knew it would be quite a lot of work to do, so I guess not providing these sources was a bit lazy of me. I needed someone like you to kick my arse to do what needed to be done. ;)

I'm not yet sure how to merge the information in all three pages into a single template in a way that is still concise and doesn't create a messy layout. Dating the Bible and Authorship of the Bible often delve into the reasons why a date, language or author is held to be probable, leading to full sentences. Is that desirable in pages with tables that are meant as overviews? Or should details on scholarly discussions be reserved to the main pages of these books, and only a few words be spared to indicate what the current consensus is in these tables? The more text we need to cram into a text box, the more I'm leaning towards a model of subrows rather than columns. Let me show you what I mean:

Columns model example (apt for concise summary of consensus):

Book	Dating	Language	Authorship+location
Sirach	c. 180–175 BCE because blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah	Hebrew because blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah	Ben Sira in Jerusalem because blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah

Subrows model example (apt for elaborate explanation why scholars think xyz):

Book	Scholary consensus on origins
Sirach	Dating: c. 180–175 BCE because blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
	Language: Hebrew because blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
	Authorship+location: Ben Sira in Jerusalem because blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah

I would prefer the columns model: keeping the information concise so that it fits in three columns. Tables aren't meant for long stories anyway. What do you think? Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 16:43, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

@Nederlandse Leeuw: I prefer the column model. Morevoer, this template is an overview of some scholars, not a detailed article, so it should remain concise.

"I'm not yet sure how to merge the information in all three pages into a single template in a way that is still concise and doesn't create a messy layout." I do not know either. Your best chance is to ask for advice on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Christianity/Noticeboard. Veverve (talk) 16:50, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

Done, curious how the Noticeboard reacts. I'd like to hear what they think, also because I'm a bit worried about whether this will eventually lead to a merger of the Dating and Authorship articles, which isn't my intention. Meanwhile, however, I've included the template in Biblical languages, where it seems very appropriate. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 18:07, 5 January 2021 (UTC)