Talk:Nativity of Christ

Why is this a separate article? This belongs in an entry on Jesus. Just because this oft-quoted public domain 1800s Christian encyclopaedia has thousands of entries on Christianity doesn't mean that this encyclopaedia should also. If we followed this kind of micro-entry format, we'd end up with thousands of tiny entries for Christianity, Judaism, Islam, etc. We need to recognize that Wikipedia needs comprehensive articles on religion, but is not meant to be a religious encyclopaedia. Let us make sure that our entries are comprehensive, and not unnecessarily fractured into micro-entries. Sub-entries should only be created when there is a compelling need to do so. RK

Although I didn't create this article, I think this could easily be its own article, linked to from the Jesus Christ article. I was planning to add info on the nativity from one or two non-canonical gospels, the "Feast of the Nativity" and its role in the liturgical year, and perhaps something about the historical theology of the Nativity as it relates to the Incarnation. The Jesus Christ article is already quite long, and it seems to make sense to break the information down into smaller bits where feasible. Do you think this would merit its own article with these additions? If not, I'll probably eventually create an article re: the Feast of the Nativity of Christ. Wesley

It seems to me that the current entry on Jesus Christ is only about two pages long! That's pretty short for a topic of this importance. I don't understand why so many Wikipedia writers, on so many topics, keep chopping apart decent articles into many tiny little micro-articles. When we do this, then people who want to use Wikipedia need to keep on clicking from one entry to another to get the whole story, and they must keep checking the sub-links in the minor articles as well. We need a rule of thumb that keeps cohesiveness, and prevents fracturing. How about this? When we want to add a new point to an existing article, make a new heading and try to keep it in the main entry. However, as time goes by this section may grow; if it grows to more than the rest of the entry, or if it grows beyond two pages, it should get its own entry. Similarly, if other Wikipedia users comment that the new material doesn't belong, then it also should be spun off into its own article. But for the sake of easiness of use and cohesiveness, we should give the benefit of the doubt to keeping things simpler. RK

please note: the material has already been merged

Good points. My general reason for shortening things is that that's how the WWW generally works. However, keeping things together does provide better coverage of a topic, and organizing with subheadings helps a lot. I've seen you do a good job of this on many articles. Also, someone such as myself may have grandiose plans for expanding a new stub, but months may go by before such plans actually materialize. In the meantime, it would make very good sense to keep the material as part of a larger article. Thanks for taking the time to merge the material. Wesley