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Wikipedia:WikiProject Jehovah's Witnesses

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Jehovah's Witnesses
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Watch Tower presidents
Formative influences
Notable former members
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Criticism
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Welcome to the WikiProject Jehovah's Witnesses! The project helps editors working on Jehovah's Witnesses-related articles by providing a repository of information and resources, and providing a place for discussions that affect more than one article.

Key goals

  • To make the Wikipedia articles about Jehovah's Witnesses the most comprehensive and highest quality on the web.
  • To establish some guidelines to allow uniformity across articles about Jehovah's Witnesses.
  • To improve the main Jehovah's Witnesses article to featured article quality.

How to help

  1. Put your name in the alphabetical Participants list.
  2. Read the editing guidelines.
  3. Help with the open tasks.
  4. Help ensure that the more essential content relating to the Jehovah's Witnesses is at high quality. A list of topics related to the Jehovah's Witnesses which are to be found in other reference works, presumably indicating they are among the most important topics related to the JW's, can be found at Wikipedia:WikiProject Jehovah's Witnesses/Prospectus.

JW Project mini-RFC

Please add sections here to draw attention to JW-related articles that require attention of other editors involved in the project.

Resources

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Editing guidelines

When describing teachings of Jehovah's Witnesses that may be controversial, it is preferable to state that the Watch Tower Society teaches... or Jehovah's Witnesses are taught... rather than Jehovah's Witnesses believe..., unless a secondary source can be provided that indicates that the specific teaching is broadly accepted by members. For uncontroversial beliefs, it may be acceptable to use either phrase.

Cite sources

All Wikipedia articles should cite sources to allow for verification. Statements about what Jehovah's Witnesses should be supported by secondary sources that are reliable and citations to the group's publications should be avoided.

Use of scriptures

Do not cite supporting scriptures when explaining doctrines or practices. Instead, cite a publication that provides the Watch Tower Society's interpretation of the verse. Do not write like this:

Jehovah's Witnesses believe that Christians are required to 'speak in agreement'. (1 Corinthians 1:10)

Instead, write like this:

Jehovah's Witnesses believe that Christians are required to obey the command at 1 Corinthians 1:10 to "speak in agreement".<ref>{{cite book|title=1980 Yearbook of Jehovah's Witnesses|page=257|publisher=Watch Tower Society|date=1980|title=Theocratic Instrumentalities}}</ref>

Watchtower Society versus Governing Body

When referring to the leadership of Jehovah's Witnesses or those that set policy or doctrine, do not use the terms "the Watchtower Society" or "the Society". Refer specifically to the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses, or the Governing Body if the context is already clear.

Watchtower Society versus Watch Tower Society

The Watch Tower Society is a corporation incorporated in Pennsylvania that oversees the activities of subsidiary corporations used by Jehovah's Witnesses worldwide. The Watchtower Society is a New York based corporation responsible for administrative functions primarily within the United States. When referring to the Watch Tower Society or the Watchtower Society, take note of how the terms should be used.

Watch Tower Society should be used when referring to evangelical functions, including:

  • Donations to the Watch Tower Society (insurance policies, bank accounts, stocks & bonds, real estate, wills, trusts.) Note however that the Watch Tower Society instructs that annuities be directed to the Watchtower Society
  • Branch Offices
  • Construction work
  • Teaching programs
  • Writing of literature
  • Organizing conventions, including renting of facilities
  • Operation of Watch Tower Society facilities

Watchtower Society should be used when referring to administrative functions, including:

  • Assets (including facilities and real estate) owned by the Watchtower Society
  • The Watchtower Society's legal department
  • International corporations overseen by the Watchtower Society
  • Hosting Gilead/Missionary Schools
  • Production and shipping of literature

When referring to the following, context determines which should be used:

  • Headquarters
  • President (or secretary, etc.)

Regarding publications of Jehovah's Witnesses, though there is some variation (mostly in first-person accounts):

  • Literature published prior to 1986 is "published by the Watch Tower [Bible and Tract] Society [of New York]"
  • Literature published from 1986 to 2000 is "published by the Watchtower [Bible and Tract] Society [of New York]"
  • Literature since 2001 is "published by Jehovah's Witnesses"

Readability for non-Jehovah's Witnesses

Wikipedia articles are for the general public, and as such, the articles about Jehovah's Witnesses should not require familiarity with Jehovah's Witnesses, the Bible or Christian beliefs. Avoid phrases that are unique to Jehovah's Witnesses that haven't been defined within the article. Generally avoid colloquialisms unique to Jehovah's Witnesses unless quoting directly from a source.

Referring to Jehovah's Witnesses

It is common for Jehovah's Witness adherents to refer to the name "Jehovah's Witnesses" with the intended meaning that the term describes people who are literally witnesses of (or for) Jehovah. However, to maintain a neutral tone, articles should use the terms "Jehovah's Witness" and "Jehovah's Witnesses" as proper nouns (consistent with the manner in which the name of the denomination is generally registered officially) rather than a simple possessive (except when directly quoting cited text):

  • Jane is one of Jehovah's Witnesses
  • John and Jane are Witnesses of Jehovah
  • John and Jane are members of Jehovah's Witnesses
  • According to the Watch Tower Society, "Jehovah's Witnesses are Witnesses for Jehovah"

When referring to the denomination as a whole, Jehovah's Witnesses is a singular proper noun (in the same manner as any other organisation or product name containing a plural form):

  • Jehovah's Witnesses is a religious denomination (the verb is agrees with the singular proper noun Jehovah's Witnesses and the singular noun denomination)
  • Jehovah's Witnesses are a religious denomination (the verb are disagrees with the singular noun denomination)

When referring to members of the denomination, Jehovah's Witness is singular and Jehovah's Witnesses is plural:

  • Jane is a Jehovah's Witness
  • John and Jane are Jehovah's Witnesses

Where it is unclear whether the entire denomination or a group of members is indicated, it is generally preferable to use the plural form:

  • Jehovah's Witnesses are holding a convention

Members should not be referred to using the informal term "a Jehovah":

  • Jane is a Jehovah
  • the Jehovahs are holding a convention
See also: Wikipedia:Piped_link § Intuitiveness

When wikilinking a generic term, JW-related articles should link to the article about the generic term rather than JW-specific terms. For example, "hymns" should be linked to hymn, not Kingdom songs. Where it may be helpful to link to the JW-specific term, rephrase to include a link to both terms, e.g.:

Meetings of Jehovah's Witnesses are opened with the singing of hymns, which they refer to as Kingdom songs.

Contradictions

Editors should not attempt to reconcile contradictory statements in Watch Tower Society publications, as this is original research. Simply state both statements, and allow the reader to determine how to reconcile them. For example:

Jehovah's Witnesses publications vary on who will survive Armageddon. While The Watchtower has often stated that Jehovah's Witnesses cannot speculate on who will survive Armageddon[1][2], it has also indicated that ...[3][4].

Templates

A vertical 'Part of a series...' template can be added to JW-related articles using the {{Jehovah's Witnesses}} template.

Alternatively, a horizontal navbox can be included using the {{Jehovah's Witnesses navbox}} template. This template should be used where the article is too short to justify the vertical template, or if other layout issues make the vertical template impractical. The horizontal template may also be used where the article is only of secondary importance to Jehovah's Witnesses.

Talk page notice

Please tag the Talk pages of articles which are about Jehovah's Witnesses with the {{WikiProject Christianity|jehovah's-witnesses=yes|jehovah's-witnesses-importance=}} template, which expands to the following:

 Christianity: Witnesses Unassessed
 This article is within the scope of WikiProject Christianity, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Christianity on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ChristianityWikipedia:WikiProject ChristianityTemplate:WikiProject ChristianityChristianity
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This article is supported by WikiProject Jehovah's Witnesses.

Stub

Please tag JW-related stubs with {{JehovahsWitnesses-stub}} to help monitor them.

Categories

For the full category list, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Jehovah's Witnesses/Categories

Articles referring to Jehovah's Witnesses

Deleted articles

An article alerts page for this WikiProject was created in September 2017. Refer to Wikipedia:WikiProject Jehovah's Witnesses/Article alerts (and its History page) for more recent information. The list below indicates articles deleted prior to the creation of the Alerts page, or that were not captured there for other reasons.

Members

Anyone who is interested to improve Jehovah’s Witnesses-related articles can join this project. Editors can add themselves to the list of JW WikiProject members here.

Project members may also add the {{User JWProject}} template to their userpages, which expands to:

 This user is a member of WikiProject Jehovah's Witnesses.
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