The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep all. Pigman☿ 23:18, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Master Hilarion, et al[edit]

Master Hilarion (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

Article about a... thing... that has no notability outside of an obscure Victorian spiritualist movenment. Some material might be merged into Seven Rays, H. P. Blavatsky, etc. Adam Cuerden talk 16:15, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Also nominating for delete/merge:

and the Theosophy sectoon of Count of St. Germain, at least, if the huge section discussing a dozen or so different Theosophanist's views on him in great detail is again restored. All form part of a huge walled garden. Adam Cuerden talk 16:15, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

[The above related-AfD links have been added in the interests of process transparency. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 21:16, 15 December 2007 (UTC)][reply]
Since I am the individual being referred to by User:Fireplace, let me again repeat: I was referring to the mentality that desires to DENY information on subjects they find worthless. I had written: "Today that same mentality would smother access to subjects that it deems "fringe" and "pseudoscience". You have no right to make that value judgement when dealing with sourced and referenced articles, no matter what the subject matter. Using that tactic is simply not the way to build Wikipedia into the academic and NPOV encyclopedia that it is intended to be. "
I object to deletion. Before considering how to eliminate these few articles on subjects that many people consider spiritually significant to their lives, how about first considering the elimination of the
In the last 132 years, hundreds of books have been written about "Theosophy" and the "Ascended Master Teachings", in various languages and by many publishers. These have described their religious / philosophical theories, their "saints" and adepts, and the social phenomena of the 19th and 20th century organizations that developed from the foundations of the writings of Helena Blavatsky, Rudolph Steiner, Alice Bailey, Guy Ballard, and various others. Great White Brotherhood, Hilarion, Sanat Kumara, Morya, Kuthumi, Paul the Venetian, Serapis Bey, Master Jesus, Djwal Khul all are prominent in many 19th and 20th century religious and philosophical organizations.
All one can do with any religion, let alone those apart from the mainstream, is to faithfully report their beliefs taken from the literature of the believers of their religious belief system. In doing so, we are not assesing truth claims (such as the Mormons believing that God is a physical being on another planet), one simply reports on the beliefs held, with as much accuracy as possible - with reliable sources and references.
There is no need at all to assess the truth claims of the 20th century new religions. If people were to delve into assessing the truth claims of religion, then an entry on Christianity may as well begin with assessing whether God exists. The best approach would seem to be an accurate rendition of any movement's beliefs, nature, history and activities (regardless of what a Wikipedia editor's own views are). Questioning the validity or "notability" of religious beliefs isn't the role of an encyclopedia entry. Arion (talk) 19:46, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I have been a researcher for the past 4 decades of the new religious movements of the 20th century, especially the ones born from the foundations of Esoteric Buddhism, "New Thought", Theosophical and Ascended Master Teachings. Our university department has especially examined the historical and social contexts of those minority religions. To exclude relevant data from Wikipedia on their beliefs, key religious "saints" known as "Ascended Masters", and the individuals who helped shape these organizations would be unthinkable. Arion (talk) 05:07, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I am against deletion or merging of the articles on Dwal Khul, Hilarion, Sanat Kumara, Morya, Kuthumi, Paul the Venetian, Serapis Bey, and Master Jesus. They are spiritually, historically, and socio-culturally significant to stand as separate articles Sage 122568.231.166.180 (talk) 17:44, 14 December 2007 (UTC)— 68.231.166.180 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]

No to any merging or redirecting As for reliable sources and verifiability: An excellent point was raised by DGG who pointed out that its "just as appropriate to use Theosophical sources as a description as to describe those of any other religion from its works." I agree that is how you get an accurate description of the beliefs of a religion or a philosophical concept. The article on Jehovah's Witnesses is an example how discussions of a religious belief have references to books written by the adherents of that belief. The same is true of the Roman Catholic Church and references to the "self-published" Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church when discussing what Catholic beliefs are. Arguments that we can apply different standards to a religion that has a smaller number of members are unconvincing.

An example of the problem with using an article that someone may erroneously consider a "reliable source" is that the author of that article may know practically nothing about the actual beliefs, and may only be interested in expressing contempt and ridicule of the subject. Fireplace used such an article (which used mocking terms like "two-bit alias" and "one of the kookiest cults") from the Los Angeles Magazine (See WP:Fringe_theories/Noticeboard#Walled_gardens_of_woo) to completely rewrite the I AM Activity article into an article written from a POV that this religious belief is a fraudulent con game, with inaccuracies such as the erroneous statement (from that Los Angeles Magazine hatchet job) that Guy Ballard claimed to be the reincarnation of Saint Germain or Jesus! Any review of the original sources would quickly reveal how contrary to their beliefs such a statement was. This emphasizes the problem with using outside sources to describe the religious beliefs of a church or religion. Arion (talk) 17:26, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There were factual inaccuracies placed in the "I AM" Activity article by User:Fireplace as of result of his relying on an error-riddled article from Los Angeles Magazine. I just made edits that corrected a number of factual inaccuracies in this Wikipedia article, and gave specific citations to actual source documents to verify those edits. Within one half hour these corrective edits were reverted by Adam Cuerden (a Wikipedia administrator). What kind of explanation can possibly justify such action - again made without discussion nor consensus? Arion (talk) 19:22, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

*Keep all, regardless of what other editors think about Theosophy (and I'd like to note that I am not particularly fond of Theosophy), it is without a doubt a notable new religious movement and it's major figures are each deserving of an article just as much as the figures of any other religion. One must note that the Christian Bible is essentially a self-published work of the Roman Catholic Church, with a number of more modern translations also published within the walled garden of Christian religious publishers. Are you FRINGE guys serious about trying to apply this science guideline to matters of spiritual belief, or is this some kind of joke? Because if the former, you've just made yourself look rather ridiculous and this calls into question some of the other uses which has been made of this guideline. Curious Blue (talk) 22:07, 15 December 2007 (UTC) — User:Curious Blue has been indefinitely blocked as a checkuser-confirmed sockpuppet.[reply]

there seems to be a considerable discussion on this at Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard, initiated by the nominator of these articles, and, Fireplace, you've taken part in it yourself. is there so much prejudice against the articles as to try to claim different rationales in different processes?. At Fringe, your argument was that the religion was "pseudo-philosophy." DGG (talk) 22:35, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That's precisely the discussion I was referring to. Is this what is known as "forum shopping"? Curious Blue (talk) 22:43, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think this tone is helpful, please assume good faith. Curious Blue: The issue isn't whether the religion itself is notable -- it is. The issue is whether the individual deities of its pantheon are notable per the "significant coverage in independent sources" standard. DGG: There is a WP:N aspect of this discussion, appropriate for AfD. There is *also* a WP:NPOV and WP:UNDUE aspect, appropriate for flagging at the fringe noticeboard and for discussion on the individual talk pages. This isn't forum shopping -- there are multiple aspects to the discussion. Fireplace (talk) 22:52, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I've replied on your talk page. My apologies, I did go too far with that forum shopping remark. Otherwise, though I stand by my comments as I was careful to talk about appearances leaving open the possibility that the appearances were just that, surface only. Curious Blue (talk) 00:23, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Not an "obscure Victorian spiritualist movenment [sic]": Not "Victorian", it started in the late 1800s and continues today; not one movement, but several; not "spiritualist", Theosophy and its descendants are part of Western esoteric tradition, forerunner of the modern New Age movement which generates a marketplace of billions of dollars a year today. Theosophy also has significant history in India. Google Books search for "Theosophy" shows 9,780 books. How many Google webhits? Over 2,400,000. Google tests have their flaws, but a number that large can't qualify as "obscure".
  • Notable and verifiable: Inconsistent referencing is not a reason to delete, it's a reason to improve. References can be found; Google Books shows hundreds of hits for each title, and Google Scholar over a hundred each. (The searches are not simple; some of the names have alternate spellings). Further on notability: here are a few Theosophists... poet WB Yeats; composer Alexander Scriabin; Rudolf Steiner, founder of the Waldorf Schools. Van Morrison's 1982 album Beautiful Vision states in its liner notes that the lyrics were influenced by a Theosophical book describing the teachings of Djwal Khul, one of the articles listed in this AfD.
  • Not a WP:walled garden: Examples that link to the listed pages within a few clicks: Philosophy - Freemasonry, Kabbalah, Gnosticism, Hermeticism, Alchemy, Mysticism, Humanism, Metaphysics, Philosophy of religion, Esoteric Christianity; and, notable people - Carl Jung, WB Yeats, Alexander Scriabin, Rudolf Steiner, William James, Emanuel Swedenborg, Arthur Schopenhauer. (Some were Theosophists, but not all. The point is they link in a few clicks to the nominated pages showing there is no walled garden).
  • References: It is not unusual for articles on religion to be based on references published by members of the religion. Examples: Ecumenical council, Eucharist (Catholic Church) , John of Damascus, Full communion ...each have no references not published by Catholic sources. Many religious articles on Wikipedia currently have no references at all. Examples: Divine Liturgy, Council of Ephesus, Veneration, Church Fathers. (No specific meaning in choice of examples, just for illustration). And, some of the nominated pages do have non-Theosophy-related references. I've not vetted them in detail, but I found these in a quick review: University of California Press, State University of New York Press, North Atlantic Books, Kessinger Publishing, Baker Book House, Sophia Perennis.
  • Summary: The topics are notable and verifiable; not a WP:walled garden; they are part of a religious philosophy that has influenced Western society and others for over a hundred years. A religion may be small, but that does not mean its information should be excluded from Wikipedia. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 00:30, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
[Some of my comment may end up cross-posted at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Great White Brotherhood, because that closely-related topic was nominated separately for deletion. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 00:30, 16 December 2007 (UTC)][reply]

Strong keep: This entry has 9 sources all tackling the subject in a an appropriate manner for their use the breadth and depth of these sources confirms both notability and verifiability. I would suggest that the user who started the afd is simply "unaware" of the subject because they are not interested in/an expert in the field.

I'd like to point out that notability is relative, not absolute, else few things would pass it. For example, as far as most of the world's 6 billion people are concerned, football (as played in America, not soccer) is a minority sport with little following or notability. I'd wager that the 90% of the world's population couldn't tell you what month the super bowl is played in, let alone which team won it. If notability was absolute you'd simply look at the fact that the game isn't played or watched anywhere else in the world except in a few specialist circles, then you'd look at the percent of the world's population who care about it (basically less than half of the US population), then you'd look at the people who don't care about it (most of the world's population), and you'd declare that football was not notable in absolute terms. - perfectblue (talk) 11:43, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This content would be a lot more accessible to a general audience if it were condensed and merged to a single article, or one main article with a few linked articles. If merging isn't acceptable I'd have to suggest deletion. Dan Beale-Cocks 14:24, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, and as for merging, not only do I not see the point but the seven rays and ascended master teachings articles would be far too long with all the info on the ascended masters in them as well. This is what we do when articles are too long - split them. Just a long standing opinion of mine that it just looks tidier having separate articles on subjects where possible rather than having one huge article with an awkward title, which in this case would be on far too broad a topic, that people get redirected to.

Saying the ascended masters have no notability outside of theosophy is a silly rationale, just like saying the 1976 Wimbledon Championships have no notability outside of tennis and therefore all those articles should be deleted. There are published sources on this subject, therefore there is enough verifiable information.

I can't see what makes the articles on the ascended masters unmaintainable. I can, however, share User:Jack-A-Roe's concerns above of an obvious personal POV influence in the nominator's rationale for this whole thing... - Zeibura (Talk) 19:17, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Providing balance for the articles by adding a third party skeptical viewpoint: I added to the articles about the “Masters” that Madame Blavatsky spoke of in her lifetime the skeptical view of scholar K. Paul Johnson, who maintains that the “Masters” were actually idealizations of people who were her mentors. According to Johnson:

These are all referenced to the appropriate page in Johnson’s book Initiates of Theosophical Masters Albany, New York:1995 State University of New York Press.

The other "Masters" were apparently added by C.W. Leadbeater in his book The Masters and the Path.

In Hindu mythology, Sanat Kumara is a minor deity. Sanat Kumara is mentioned in Madame Blavatsky's most important work The Secret Doctrine. Keraunos (talk) 12:16, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I favor keeping those articles in Wikipedia since they are references with reliable sources. Is there suddenly a problem with space on Wikipedia? There sure seems to be room for hundreds of articles on characters from mythology, Catholic saints, and gods of Hinduism. Yet, there is no room for a mere handful of articles on Theosophical and Ascended Master teachings? Sage 1225Sage1225 (talk) 16:06, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I believe OUP makes the bulk of its money from publishing the Bible (it used have a UK monopoly, together with Cambridge--don't know if it still does) and OU was explicitly founded and endowed as a Christian organization. Therefore anything about Christian saints published by them is by your method of reasoning not 3rd party. This can be extended. Nothing about activities in the US can be N unless we find sources by those in other countries. Nothing by black authors is notable, unless those of other races write about it. Nothing by males is notable unless there are substantial publications about it by females. Nothing, in fact, written by humans will be notable until extraterrestrials discover us and start compiling their galactic encyclopedia. I am of course merely joking, but to show that at some point there is a cut-off by what we mean by "third party" or "independent". You have found yourself saying one rather extreme position, and if I were to say that any Religion, however small, determines its own notabiliy, I would be as far out in the opposite.
So the real question is where does Theosophy fall? Maybe its not a line, but a range: I'd say that it was large enough for its first level divine entities and organizations and leaders to be notable, but not below that, whereas the Christian church is large enough to accept the notability of not just the trinity, but all the saints. I think even here I wouldn't accept the lower level of "blessed" It's unfortunate that we are in the situation where the choice is N/~N. It makes these problems more difficult than they need be. DGG (talk) 23:32, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Key figures in religious movemrnts are automatically significant. Dimadick (talk) 15:51, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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