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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Prosperity theology/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Ian Rose 23:12, 27 February 2012 [1].

Prosperity theology

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Prosperity theology (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Nominator(s): ItsZippy (talk • contributions), Mark Arsten 20:16, 15 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Two editors and I have been editing and improving this article since the summer. It achieved Good Article status on 21 December and was Peer Reviewed on 29 December; it has been under constant improvement throughout. It has now reached a stage where we believe the article covers everything relevant in appropriate depth. It has undergone a few copyedits for style, neutrality and the like (as well as regular ongoing improvements). The article is now comprehensive in coverage; written neutrally, with numerous reliable sources; and written to a good standard. We now believe that it is ready for Featured Article status. ItsZippy (talk • contributions) 20:16, 15 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]


  • SupportComments Nicely written, and an interesting subject. I've made a couple of tweaks, hope you like them.
"three of the four largest churches". Is that church as in denomination or congregation?
There is a lot of criticism from other branches of Christianity, but not much rebuttal or other response. Surely some theologians have spoken for them? Also as this is now a multinational movement it would be interesting to get say a Buddhist response in Korea.
I was surprised that the Christian responses quoted have not focussed on Jesus clearing the money changers out of the temple or his teachings about it being easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the gates of heaven.
Regards ϢereSpielChequers 15:43, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, your edits look good to me. I am really bad with capitalization :( I made the first change you suggested, I'll look around for information about the other two. Mark Arsten (talk) 16:36, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you very much for your comments. I have added a short section on the influence of prosperity theology in South Korea, though that is still from a Christian perspective; I shall look out for comments from other beliefs. ItsZippy (talk • contributions) 18:15, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I added a bit of a theological rebuttal, I hope it works there. I didn't find much in the way for criticism from Korea or non-Christian criticisms. I e-mailed a Korean friend of mine about it though, so they might know of something. Thanks, Mark Arsten (talk) 22:03, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for those changes, especially the Korean bit. I'm still just a tad concerned about balance, though I appreciate that is very different in such a context. Any established reliable source on theology is likely to be dismissive of this sort of thing, and I'm consciously restraining myself from asking for success stories. But on the narrow part of the criteria that I check I think it is ready. BTW A lead image other than the default Christian one might be in order, and if MOS doesn't deprecate see also sections I'd be tempted by Plutus ϢereSpielChequers 22:22, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Alright, thanks a lot for your support and comments. I'll try to take another look at the things you mentioned. Mark Arsten (talk) 23:24, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: Re the above, there is also the Sermon on the Mount, Matt 6:19–21; "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt ... but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust duth corrupt ... for where your treasure is, there shall your heart be also". I reviewed this article at peer review, and will post further comments here shortly. Brianboulton (talk) 19:08, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Good idea, one of the main sources we were using mentioned that verse, so I put it in. Mark Arsten (talk) 20:40, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comments: Well thought out. I've made what I hope are a few stylistic improvements. Substantively I think it's a fine article.--John Foxe (talk) 23:41, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Thanks for taking a look, your edits look great to me. Mark Arsten (talk) 23:49, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Source review - spotchecks not done, no comment on source comprehensiveness. Nikkimaria (talk) 05:05, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Check alphabetization of Bibliography
  • Lindberg Carter or Carter Lindberg? van or Van Biema? Time or TIME or Time Magazine? Check for naming consistency
  • Be consistent in whether authors are listed first or last name first
  • FN 36: are you missing a name here?
  • Check italicization in footnotes
  • FN 51: page(s)?
  • Be consistent in whether or not ISBNs are hyphenated
  • What is OCMS? Nikkimaria (talk) 05:05, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thanks, I should have noticed those before. Ok, I think I have gotten most of them, we still have to hyphenate the ISBNs and add page numbers for #51. Mark Arsten (talk) 05:38, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Did those last two, hope I formatted the paper's references correctly. Mark Arsten (talk) 20:03, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

SupportLeaning to support: A thought-provoking article which will be a credit to TFA in due course. I gave a detailed peer review, hence my present comments are mainly fairly minor prose quibbles:-

  • Each of the four lead paragraphs begins "Prosperity theology..." You need to find ways of varying this phrasing. OK for the first and fourth, say, but change the beginnings of the other two.
  • Recommend add the parenthetical words "(reconciliation with God)" after the first mention of "atonement"
  • Theology section, fourth line: replace possibly ambiguous "teaching that" with "and teaches that"
  • Same section, third paragraph: replace awkward "with other teachers portraying..." with "while other teachers portray..."
  • You have introduced Copeland and Dollar without saying who thy are. One can find this information via the links, but that means leaving the article. A very brief description, such as "televangelist" or "Word of Fath teacher" would suffice. The principle should be applied to other first mentions in the text, e.g. T.D. Jakes in the "Practices" subsection
  • Recent US history: "As of 2006" sounds strange when we are in 2012. Not sure how to reword this, but perhaps: "By 2006, three of the four largest congregations in the United States had taught prosperity theology", (or possibly "were teaching")?
  • Author of The prayer of Jabez?
  • Theological criticism: I am confused by this sentence: "In Mark: Jesus, Servant and Savior, R. Kent Hughes notes that some rabbis taught that material blessings were a sign of God's favor, citing Jesus' statement in Mark 10:25 that "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God" (KJV) as evidence to oppose such thinking.[42] I can only make sense of this if a full stop follows "a sign of God's favor", then "He cites Jesus' statement in Mark..." etc
  • "criticizing John Avanzini's teaching → " and criticizies John Avanzini's teaching". Later in the sentence: "...a misrepresentation and noting" becomes "a misrepresentation, noting..."
  • "Jones criticizes the doctrine's view of faith as a spiritual force..." I find that a little confusing. The essence of prosperity theology is surely its belief that faith confers material advantages.
  • What is "negative confession"?
  • Socioeconomic analysis: I recommend you don't use the exclusively American term "exurb", when "commuter town" would be understood by all, not just American readers.
  • Yung Hwa introduced without explanation or link

I will be happy to support when these cleared up. Brianboulton (talk) 17:39, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for that. I have done everything except for clarifying negative confession, which I will do later this evening/tomorrow. ItsZippy (talk • contributions) 18:35, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I given a basic clarification of negative confession. If you think further explanation or an example is needed, let me know and I can do so later. ItsZippy (talk • contributions) 18:38, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I am satisfied with your responses and have now registered my support. Well done. Brianboulton (talk) 14:43, 1 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comments on the lead.

  • Trying to think of synonyms to avoid the jingle here: "part of the path". I can't.
  • "the removal of sickness and poverty"—is there a better word than "removal"?
  • "Some prosperity churches also teach about financial responsibility, though some journalists and academics have"—can the doubling up of "some" be avoided?
  • critics ... criticized. It's OK, but if there's a substitute for one, I'd use it.
  • Logic problem in the timing and the different treatment of the middle class and the poor: "Prosperity theology has drawn followers from the American middle class and has become popular among the poor." Both are in the "gradual" past tense, but one involves popularity, and one has drawn followers. Why are the two social classes treated with different wording? (We assume the poor are American, too.)

It's pretty well-written, although I'm sure I'd nit-pick in the rest. Tony (talk) 06:03, 20 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Thanks for the compliment! I took a stab at revising problematic parts of the lead, hope my edits helped. Mark Arsten (talk) 06:24, 20 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Image review

An interesting topic, although not an idea I really agree with. —Andrewstalk 03:11, 25 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

    • Alright, I did the first two. I couldn't find evidence for the date of the third so I removed it. The website it was taken from claimed it was public domain, but didn't give any evidence. Mark Arsten (talk) 15:16, 25 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support on images —Andrewstalk 19:03, 25 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Eisfbnore

  • "J. Matthew Wilson of Southern Methodist University compares the movement to Black liberation theology due to its focus on uplifting oppressed groups..." — the adjectival "due to" should be replaced with the adverbial "owing to", as its antecedent is another verb than "to be" ("compare").
  • "...the 19th century belief that the United States was entitled to the West." — "19th-century" should be hyphenated as it is a compound adjective.
  • Re: sources: Please don't mix cite and citation templates as they generate dissimilar punctuation (see Clifton 2009). Eisfbnore talk 14:29, 16 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I had almost forgotten this was open, no comments for two weeks! Alright, I fixed the two prose gaffs and the Cite book template. It's ok that we use Cite News in the References section though, right? Mark Arsten (talk) 14:34, 16 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thank you for the fixes. Ref 48 uses a citation template, so you might want to change that (perhaps cite journal?). --Eisfbnore talk 14:46, 16 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Ok, I think I've gotten rid of all the "Citation" templates in the References section and the "Cite X" templates in the Bibliography. Mark Arsten (talk) 15:16, 16 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note -- Like to see a spotcheck of sources for accuracy and avoidance of close paraphrasing, please. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 09:38, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Spotchecks - I did spotchecks on the online sources (numbers based on this revision). I checked 2a, 2b, 5a, 2c, 5b, 2d, 10a, 2e, 10c, 5e, 5f, 10d, 10e, 5g, 36a, 36b, 10f, 5j, 41, 43, 48b, 51, 52, 53, 56, 57, 58, 10g, 10i, 5k, 72, 75, 5i, and all were accurate and did not have close paraphrasing. The following are also accurate and not close paraphrasing, but I do have a few comments:

  • 10b, Bowler is/was a student at Duke. I read the article thinking she was faculty. I’d get rid of the Duke part.
    • Was a student, but is now faculty--rephrased for clarity. Mark Arsten (talk) 04:43, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 40, move citation to end of sentence
  • 5h, i - reference Warren too for completeness
  • 48a, this reference could be used in a few more of the previous sentence with this source
    • I'm not 100% sure what you mean here, but I added inline citations for the quoted part and his criticism of Avanzini. Did this fix your concerns? Mark Arsten (talk) 05:27, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • Most of the article has almost every sentence cited. This is a section that you use one reference for multiple sentences. I'm just saying you could use the ref in these sentence too, but I'm not sure what is the expected way to do it. Strafpeloton2 (talk) 15:22, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
        • Ok, I think it's generally Ok to use one ref for multiple sentences in that passage since there's nothing unduly controversial and no direct quotes in them. Mark Arsten (talk) 16:01, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
          • I figured it was OK, but I was just pointing out the inconsistency. Strafpeloton2 (talk) 17:06, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 54, I read this to be the disciples also suffered (true), but the source says the disciples expected suffering. Please make this clear.
    • I removed the offending part of the sentence, I don't think it was much of a loss. Mark Arsten (talk) 05:27, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 55, page 8 not 7, then linked with current ref 56 (page 8)
    • I think I fixed the issue. Mark Arsten (talk) 05:27, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • I think you should still use a ref at the end of the sentence instead of taking it out. The ref should be to page 8. Just note that page 8 is already been used in the article (by the ref 56 when I first read the article - I think the one from the next sentence). Strafpeloton2 (talk) 15:22, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 10h, the manifest destiny part is correctly cited, but the ref doesn’t describe what manifest destiny was pertaining to West. Move the ref to after manifest destiny. I don't think the last part is controversial and needs a reference.
  • 2f, Wouldn’t it be better to cite Harris directly, since the text of 2f cites “(Harris, 1981: 141)”?
    • Cited him directly. Mark Arsten (talk) 05:27, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • I assumed a typo and changed p 41 to p 141 based on source 2. Strafpeloton2 (talk) 15:22, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
        • Yep, but in my defense, it was getting pretty late by then. Mark Arsten (talk) 16:01, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Based on what I read, I would not anticipate any of the off-line sources would have accuracy or close paraphrasing issues. Strafpeloton2 (talk) 03:32, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

One more question/observation. Why did you break up the Assemblies of God source into separate citations that are page-specific (refs 51–55, 75) but you did not do the same thing for source #2? I don't know if it's incorrect, but it is inconsistent. It was easier to spotcheck the Assemblies of God refs, but I don't know if I would generalize that into saying that every reference should be page-specific. Strafpeloton2 (talk) 15:22, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I have made the references to that source page specific. ItsZippy (talk • contributions) 15:39, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Oops, I didn't realize you had done this. I formatted them further. Mark Arsten (talk) 15:48, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Support on Spotchecks — All my comments and trivial pseudo-questions were addressed. This was an interesting read and the sources look good to me. Strafpeloton2 (talk) 17:06, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support Comments from Noleander

  • quote marks? "Prosperity theology (sometimes referred to as the prosperity gospel or the "health and wealth" gospel) ..." - Not sure the quotes around "health and wealth" are needed ... anything in bold is a term that is getting defined.
  • Link - South Korea ... first use should be a link.
  • Post-lead definition: I would expect the first sentence after the lead to define PT. The 1st two sentences are: "Teachers of prosperity theology focus on personal empowerment, promoting a positive view of the spirit and body. The doctrine holds that Christians are entitled to well-being and, because physical and spiritual realities are seen as one inseparable reality, this is interpreted as physical health and economic prosperity." Maybe they should be reversed?
  • "They maintain that Christians ..." . The "they" applies to the teachers, but that is 2 sentences earlier. So, should probably restate "The teachers maintain..." or "Proponents maintain .."
  • Add link to caption: "The parable of the talents (as depicted in a 1712 woodcut) is often cited in support of prosperity theology...." Many readers skim captions, and so they should contain links, even if linked in body. Does "parable of talents" have a link? if so, put in caption.
  • Include links: " Frequently quoted verses include: ... " All bible verses in the article should use the {{bibleverse}} template. E.g. {{Bibleverse|BOOK#|BOOKNAME|c:v–c:v|SOURCE}} so readers can click on in it and see the verse quoted in the context of the chapter.
  • Add date context: "The early Pentecostal Movement did not embrace prosperity theology. A recognizable form of the doctrine began to take shape within the movement during the 1940s and 1950s,..." - Need a date/year in the 1st sentence to establish timeframe of "early PM".
  • Add "Works" section - If there are a handful of books that are representative of the movement (i.e. well-known, or heavily commented upon by 2ndary sources) the article should have a "Works" section at the bottom, or perhaps just a "Further reading" section, listing them. But only do that if 2ndary sources designate the works as major/representative ... otherwise it may verge on OR if an editor (such as yourself) concocts a list.
  • New Thought movement: Including a sidebar Navbox for "New Thought" carries a lot of weight, yet the text of the article does not seem to support the strength of that. E.g. the article says "Coleman has speculated that modern-day prosperity theology borrows heavily from the New Thought movement, though he admits that the connection is sometimes unclear.". I'd recommend either (a) removing the NT sidebar; or (b) adding more material in the article justifying a strong connection.
  • What other movements? - "As is true of other prosperity movements, there is no theological governing body ..." Not clear what "this" movement is (Word of faith?) and what the "other" movements are.
  • More material? - "Church leaders are often criticized for abusing the faith of their parishioners by enriching themselves through large donations." - Are there more sources, more detail on this? I expected this to be a prominent issue, with more detail in the article.

End Noleander comments. --Noleander (talk) 21:21, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your notes, Noleander. I have made most of the changes you have suggested. Since reversing the two sentences in the first section after the lead, the "They maintain that Christians ..." is only a sentence after a reference to the teachers, solving the ambiguity problem. ItsZippy (talk • contributions) 21:31, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Done Bible verses & removed New Thought navbox. I've left the early Pentacostalism for now as I don't have the dates off the top of my head (I expect Mark can fix that quite easily). I'll have a look for any works and add what I find (I'll let you know when I do). ItsZippy (talk • contributions) 21:43, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, it looks good. I changed my "Comments" to "Support", on the premise that the final couple of bullet items I added will be addressed. --Noleander (talk) 21:45, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I think I took care of the rest of your comments. Mark Arsten (talk) 23:11, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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