Talk:Erasmus

Birth date

The more I read, the less comfortable I am that he was born in 1466. 1469 is very plausible.

As I understand it, the year was calculated by taking the year of his ordination (1493 according to Beatus Rheanus) and subtracting the 25(or 24?) year minimum age for ordination: 1469 is barely possible.

However research of the Gouda archives (New Evidence on Erasmus’ Youth In: Erasmus Studies 2017) makes the 1493 year implausible, and suggests 1496: which means Erasmus could be born before 1471.

The attraction, to me, of a 1469-ish date is it makes much more sense of his biography: if his parents left Rotterdam after his first year (when his father started in Wouden,) he started school at 6 not 9, started Deventer at 9 not 12, was orphaned at 13 not 16, went to 's Hertogenbosch at 14 not 17, went into the novitiate at 17 not 20, fell for Rogerius and professed at age 18 not 21 (Thomas Cromwell professed at age 14 b.t.w), went to Cambrai at 24, became a priest under Bishop Henry at age 25 and started studying in Paris at age 26 not 29: otherwise why would such a brilliant man have such a delayed education?

I am not sure how to handle it: a little table with the two sets of dates for his life events? Rick Jelliffe (talk) 14:15, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Enhance section on Erasmus "Religious Toleration"?

Erasmus is so great that it would not diminish his greatness to mention that he expressed antisemitic sentiments. Please consider adding a sentence or two in the section “Religious toleration”.Gery.shachar (talk) 16:06, 22 October 2019 (UTC)

The nature of his alleged anti-semitism is very debatable. He tended to use "Hebrew" when he meant the race or ethnicity, and "Jew" when he meant a religious distinction. Though not always. Frequently, he used Jew in a theological sense of a Judaizer, by which he means a Christian who expresses their religion through ceremonial and ritualistic activities (e.g. by analogy with temple Judaism.)

Erasmus is impossible to decypher by taking his words literally: he habitually expressed himself with paradoxes, provocative expressions, literary allusions and jokes. Luther called him "slippery" because of it.

For example, one of his famous comments, that he did not want to go to Spain because there are too many Jews, has nothing to do with actual Jews: he is using his typical paradoxical jokey expression to say that the trouble with Spain is not all the Jews (which would indeed be the common ant-semitism of the day) but the (Salamanca) theologians and monks (who were raising his case to the Spanish Inquisition)

His theological attitude can be seen in part from his comment that "A good Jew makes a better Christian, but a bad Jew makes a worse Christian." This means that a sincere Jew becoming a Christian benefits from their heritage and morality, unless they bring ritualism or dogmatism with it; it is also a statement against forced conversions, which Erasmus certainly opposed: a person was not improved by a forced or feigned conversion, so the policy was wrong-headed. But it was said in particular reference to Pfefferkorn (see below.)

It is worthwhile noting that many of the leading conversos Jesuits were Erasmians. They found his scholarship and irenicism attractive.

He specifically recommended a Jewish scholar to teach Hebrew at the Tri-lingual college he helped set up at the University of Louvain, which may mean something, too.

But the main reason for not including something on his supposed anti-semitism is that it simply is not a big feature of his work or thought. It would be unbalanced. "Jew" could be replaced by "Judaizer" or "Ritualizer" without changing his meaning, in most cases: to the extent that he is anti-semitic, it is en passant and blind. Contrast with, for example, Martin Luther, whose vitriol against Jews was against Jews; and he was in a position of more political effect than Erasmus was.

The book Erasmus and the Jews by Shimon Markish says, apparently, that charges of anti-semitism cannot be sustained. (I haven't read it).

Contrast with Erasmus of the Low Countries [1] which asserts that (in the notorious Reuchlin affair) because Erasmus nastily questioned Pferfferkorn's motives for converting, he questions all Jews' conversions; and where the author utterly fails to see Erasmus' (condemnatory) thought behind If it is Christian to detest the Jews, on this count we are all good Christians, and to spare. Having read quite a lot of Erasmus, I can see no justification for the statement that "Erasmus hated Jews." (Remember that Pfeffekorn was himself extremely anti-semitic, and was against Reuchlin because of his position as a Hebrew scholar who had trained with non-Catholic Jews and was interested in Kabbalistic studies. Pfefferkorn, who Erasmus was being nasty about, had said that Jews did not convert because of usury, the lack of forced conversions, and their reliance on the Talmud. So it is madness to extrapolate a comment about him by Erasmus as a comment on Jews or Jewish converts in general: Erasmus is anti-semitic because he says something nasty about an ex-Jewish anti-semite who is attacking an academic gentile who had great respect for Jewish language, culture, scholastics and religion?)

All that being said, "Jew" was, when not used neutrally to mean Jews, not a positive term for Erasmus. But it was a term of reprobation not hatred, as far as I can see; so I am certain that Erasmus would not use it in that way were he alive today, as it would fail to convey his intent.

Note that Erasmus used the term "half Christians" for both Jews and Moslems: and his consistent call was that the way to convert half-christians was by peaceful example, not the sword. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 13:57, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Jews and Turks

Y I have added a small section "Jews and Turks" on the topic Gery.shachar requested. It is a complete minefield, of course, and I hope I have been NPOV in my selection of material. Please review and improve. (No flames!)

To make my own angle clearer, if that helps promote a NPOV in the article, I take Shimon Markish's interpretation more gladly than than Nathan Ron's, but Ron makes many worthy points too in multiple solid works, so I have featured a reference to Ron's work (and him by name) in order that it is not buried. (Even Markish finds something sinister underneath Erasmus' en passant comments in his unguarded private writing: for what it reveals about the undercurrent of anti-semitism of the times and where that undercurrent lead) Erasmus was more scrupulous in his public writings not to demonize Jews but instead to ironically reflect casual anti-semitic tropes back against Christians (in an edifying but sharp rebuke for them.) I would hope that someone literate reading Erasmus in good faith at that time, and aware of his ironic mode, would come away less attached to anti-semitic tropes and more concerned with peace, friendliness and concord.

I did not put in much about the Turks, perhaps a sentence that he was against enforced conversion, massacres etc might be appropriate. But there already is a paragraph on On the War with the Turks that makes the important point that the Ottomans were currently attacking Central Europe. (So Anti-Turkish feeling was as much about racism as, perhaps, the anti-Russian feeling a Ukrainian might be tempted to feel at the moment would be. I.e. not primarily.) Erasmus felt that Christians living in the Ottoman Empire should not rebel, certainly where there was no chance of success, but live peacably and by their good lives convert the Turks, who were already half-Christian. Some editor who is better aware of the situation might add something, perhaps?

I put in, then took out, examples of his ironic use of Jew, and I did not put in material on the Reuchlin/Pfefferkorn affair, as it would be unbalanced coverage. I would have liked to put in too about how many of the Spanish conversos scholars, particularly the Jesuits, were Erasmians, but it was tangential. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 08:05, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

I have also added a note on his converted Jewish doctors: there may be others too. I don't expect it is a big deal. But when Markish said that Erasmus never met a Jew (and never went out to find one), it is not right, unless we take Markish to mean a Jew in the religious/cultural sense of a presenting Jew, not some ethnic/familial sense. Also, on reading the source more, perhaps Markish's positive comments were mostly about Erasmus' considered public writings, to make it less "Markish says good; Ron says bad". And please comment if there is some landmine I am stepping on out of ignorance! Rick Jelliffe (talk) 06:12, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

This entire section, Jews and Turks, should be deleted, in fact, as I write the comments below to justify the deletion of the section, it is clear that the section is neither scholarly nor encyclopaedic in nature or quality and I am going to delete it.

To state Erasmus views about Jews or Islam based on the opinions of two individuals, Shimon Markish and Nathan Ron, does not meet the standards defined by Wikipedia that require quoting the original material rather than quoting quotes or discussions about the original material. Assumptions of a historical figure's opinions surely would require support by quoting their actual words or deeds and including a direct reference to their words or deeds rather than to opinions of others.

Additionally, the section tries to paint Erasmus as a racist with the phrase, "harsh and racial in its implications." If the author of this section wants to make the claim of racism, then find actual racism in his words and deeds and quote his actual writings, words, or deeds. If the author wants to talk about Erasmus dislike or distrust of Turks, then remove the racial comment and back up the claim with actual quotes from Erasmus, himself - there are some.

Any claim of hatred or dislike that Erasmus had for the Turks, and clearly, his own words can be quoted to show that he disliked them, must include the context of the Turks as invaders and occupiers of significant parts of Europe from the 14th century until long after Erasmus wrote about them, and even long after his death. To write that he is a racist or even to quote his own words showing his dislike for Turks without that context seems disingenuous.

There is a statement that Erasmus likely never met a practicing Jew. For a man who travelled as much has he did, that seems very likely to be false. It is far more likely that he met many Jews in his lifetime. Either way, though, either the author should be able to back it up with documented evidence or it does not belong.

This is a great example of why it is inappropriate, in an encyclopedia, to write about what a historical figure thought but, instead, it should be written about what they did, what they said that can be supported with trusted and reliable documentation, and what they wrote - quoting what they wrote instead of some unknown person's opinion of what they wrote. Diprestonus (talk) 23:31, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

"the standards defined by Wikipedia that require quoting the original material rather than quoting quotes or discussions about the original material": That would by WP:OR, which is expressly verboten on wikipedia. On the contrary, citations of reliable secondary sources are exactly what such a section should be based on.

It is possible that the text of the section should be revised, but you need to cite reliable sources for that, not his own writings and not what "seems very likely" (there are plenty of widely travelled people who have never met, say, a university professor). Furius (talk) 14:30, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Furius. Markish and Ron are not just "individuals" but two serious multiply-published scholars with opposing opinions who specialize precisely in this topic; both have written complete books on Erasmus; both provide different voices to the gentile/Western sources that dominate the Erasmian literature. (My own preference would be for the section on Pacifism to become its own article, allowing better treatment of the Turkish nuances etc.)

Yes, there needs to be mix of primary and secondary sources, especually given tat Erasmus was such a stylist: and without WP:OR; however the lack of a primary quotation or a secondary source citation is not justification for deletion: the correct approach is to add a "dubious" or "citation required" tag. Here, I think adding extra primary quotations would tend to unbalance the article; making what is IMHO a material but small aspect of his thought or biography into a big deal, which would then require a much more substantive treatment to include Erasmus' slippery language.

I have weakened the text to clarify it is Markish's claim, and added parenthesis around the added "practising" which is something reasonably (given that Markish knew of Erasmus' contacts with conversos and converts) implicit in Markish's comment.Rick Jelliffe (talk) 02:28, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

Ordination and Monastic Experience

"It is said that he never seemed to have actively worked as a priest for a long time" The citation here does not specify a page number, but I am very doubtful that this is what the reference says. He certainly never worked as a parish priest or, perhaps, cathedral canon, but the are more kinds of priests than that: for example, Jesuits are priests who are usually not parish priests. We know that Erasmus preferred to assist at mass rather than preside, he heard confession, sometimes preached (in Latin), and said the hours. Erasmus never sought, nor was granted, any papal dispensation from his priestly vows, and he never seems to have mentioned that being a priest was a burden, or that he was tricked into into (unlike his religious vows as an Augustinian Canon.) So I think this needs to be corrected, for example, "Erasmus does not seem to have actively worked as a parish priest." Rick Jelliffe (talk) 15:31, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

Sexuality v Passionate Attachment

While at Stein, Erasmus formed a "passionate attachment" with a fellow canon, Servatius Rogerus, and wrote a series of love letters in which he called Rogerus "half my soul," writing that "I have wooed you both unhappily and relentlessly." This correspondence contrasts sharply with the generally detached and much more restrained attitude he showed in his later life. (Later, while tutoring in Paris, he was suddenly dismissed by the guardian of Thomas Grey. Some have speculated about this as evidence of an illicit affair. No such mentions or accusations were ever made of Erasmus during his lifetime. His works in later life perhaps distances these earlier episodes by condemning sodomy in his works, and praising sexual desire in marriage between men and women.)

Concerning this paragraph in the article, I see it fit as needing its own section since it directly implies that Erasmus had disordered inclinations, this must be rectified since the sources manifested in the paragraph are quite antithetical to the text and could definitely be expounded upon to achieve a neutral point of view. What do you think? Raulois (talk) 21:34, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Hi. I think what matters here is NPOV and avoiding speculation. This means giving both sides of the picture, where there is credible evidence and reasonable differences in interpretation, and providing some context with good sources.

The older versions of the article erred on the speculative side IMHO, so I think it is much better now, but certainly can be improved: for example, I think the speculation about Thomas Grey has no place in Wikipedia and should be removed. Ditto "perhaps distances": utter speculation.

Older biographers (such as Facer or Froude, I forget) used to interpret comments he had made about an "Antonia" in Paris (plus the English habit of kissing, plus some comments where he says he was not immune in his youth to wildness) to say that he had some heterosexual flings when a young student, despite being a priest; then the 1990s-style gay theorists saw in his "love" letters vindication as a queer hero. (There are much more elaborate theories that put him into a gay network with Pirckheimer, Albrecht Durer etc. !)

My view? I think it does not matter what Erasmus' inclinations were, for the article. First because we simply do not know for sure. (We do know that he had enough vicious and vindictive enemies that if there had been any hint of scandal or unchastity it would have been publicized. Obviously his male friendships were deep and intensely important to him: sweet. Did he move to Cambrai to get out of a too-torrid situation? We don't know.) So, even if true, it is no more of issue than for, e.g. St John Henry Cardinal Newman or St Aelred of Riveaux: for Catholics at least it is no sin to love chastely: both Newman and Erasmus even wanted to be buried in the same grave as their beloveds... Second, because if we might consider homosexual orientation as relevant for figuring out his psychology and therefore useful for the article, there are plenty of other candidates (his illegitimacy, his weak stomach, his experience of orphanhood and war, etc.) that could be claimed as just as or more important, if someone wanted to make the case. Psychologizing about Erasmus is the bane of his biographies.

If we look at his writing, the only candidate I see where we could get some insight into his mature mind is the Sileni of Alcibiades, which riffs on an aspect of that General who rescued and fell in love with Socrates. But I don't think it reveals either any agenda other than his usual one: equipping our brains with forms to help appreciate Christ. Investigating whether he was gay might drive some interested readers to the article looking for information, so it is appropriate to have some treatment, and I am completely sympathetic that we should not "straightwash" history0; but I tend to think the article has if anything too much gay material on it, rather than not enough, because its focus should be on what he did write (not what he didn't write) and what we know (not speculation on what we don't know.) Rick Jelliffe (talk) 10:16, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Hmm, I agree with you and that speculation should be eradicated. Also, what you said about not straightwashing history reminds me when a YouTuber called Richard the Lionheart “gay” even though he had an illegitimate son. Now while I agree with you, I would like to tell you my opinion on this matter. I would like to remind you that this conception we have of “heterosexuality” is quite recent being promulgated by 20th century “gay” activists as you should already know who, in turn, have their foundations in Freud et al. Most of them have been deliberately gaywashing pre-20th century history even applying it to the Ancient Greeks… Thus, I find it extremely dangerous and precarious thus we must thence act with prudence. I hope to hear to your opinion on the matter. Raulois (talk) 06:26, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

Even if Richard the Lion-Heart (whom I was named after!) was not gay in the sense of it being an identity, Blondel certainly went beyond the call of duty to find him ;-)

The article does not use the word "gay", so I don't think it is germane to discuss the article as if it did. I edited in Erasmus' own description of his relationship with Rogerius, which was a "passionate attachment", and I put in text in a footnote about the Augustinian/Cistercian tradition of value-ing (or expecting) deep emotional friendships between monks, on the road to "spiritual friendships". So I think that goes somewhat to meet the Wikipedia NPOV criterion, that where there is a contentious issue you provide coverage of a range of opinions.

I tried to do this for the creepy sentence on Erasmus and young men: I added material that the accusation never came up in his lifetime, at a time when some of his enemies were trying to get him burned.

So while I think there is nothing wrong with raising the Rogerius material, and providing a variety of interpretations where these are sourced (just as with, say, Shakespeare's sonnets), I *do* think the speculation (namely the Thomas Grey stuff, should be removed ASAP (unless credible evidence can be found.) I have been loath to do this, because I have already edited that section rather a lot, and it is the kind of thing that can benefit from discussion. If someone else wants to remove or re-phrase the Thomas Grey sentence, I would be delighted.

I should say, I also think that the (uncited) sentence about Erasmus condemning sodomy should be removed or revised or put into a cited reference too, for the reason that it might give readers impression that the condemnation of sodomy was one of his pet subjects or a frequent feature of his work, when it simply was not. He was shocking for the times for writing books praising sex in marriage (which Francis de Sales took up), for those who could not remain virgins, but no books on sodomy. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 09:21, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

Y User Okiyo9228 has made an edit to remove some speculative material and found a citation in Erasmus' work: thanks. I have re-phrased the remaining text again a little, removed the speculative "perhaps" and moved some links around. The sentence with Thomas Grey is still now a little abrupt, but it is hard to clarify it without just putting back that entirely speculative citation. If someone can find a citation with any non-speculative evidence, it would be appropriate to have it.Rick Jelliffe (talk) 07:20, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

Hmmm. Now I see a further problem. The current text (even after the recent tweaks to remove speculation) still contrasts his emotional love-letters with his cool later persona. However, in his Copia, which are a series of exercises or examples designed to expand the students ability to say anything in many ways, he gives 200 different ways to say in Latin "I will never forget you, Thomas More." This is so sweet, but, emotionally, it still seems to be closer to the tropics than to the poles. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 07:35, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

You said you wanted the speculation removed; I removed it and now you put it back again. Raulois (talk) 13:36, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

Y Done. Personally, I really don't like removing even uncited things that contributors have put in, unless I have actually quickly looked to see if there are no citations that could back it up: it is better to first flag them as uncited or raise a discussion, trim the most unencyclopeadic speculations, see if anyone can find any evidence, and put in compromise wording. Having done that, and coming back with a fresher mind, the remaining sentence still seem just vaporous speculation (what would be next: Erasmus as a student molestor??) -- fine for an academic exercise but not encyclopedic--, and I think your preference to just remove it was the better choice, so I should not have re-added it: have re-removed it. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 09:56, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Gaywashing

A user has added text "he fell in love" with a comment like "lets not try to erase homosexuals from history".

1. This has been discussed at length here. There is no attempt to erase anyone.
2. Erasmus himself called it a 'passionate attachment', which is used in the article: I don't see why that is not the same as "falling in love", therefore the edit is redundant.
3. The article uses the phrase "love letter", so the word love is indeed there; therefore the edit is redundant.
4. The article does quote MacCulloch in notes.
5. The article does mention other possibilities apart from the binary homosexual/heterosexual split: that young monks having emotional relationships was common and expected, indeed regarded as healthy. (The article also brings out a rather speculative comment about Armonius.)
6. Whether Erasmus was homosexual or bi or transitory or homosocial etc. is entirely speculative: there are other quotes from him that suggest (in the interpretation of previous scholars who wanted him to fit in with *their* druthers) he visited a female prostitute in his student days. I think they are too speculative to have a place. If he was homosexual in orientation, even with Rogerius, there is no indication he acted (He says to Rogerius his love was rebuffed): indeed he left the monastary and refused to return.
7. Erasmus, of all people, had a lifelong history of writing according to literary forms. So it is difficult to automatically assume his love letters were not, in some part, an exploration of a gushy literary form. Men in those times were much more prone to speak in terms of love: if you have ever lived in an Asian country where best friends disconcertingly walk hand-in-hand showing their love without connoting a sexual attachment, you become less keen to necessarly conflate deep mateship with sex.
8. No-one (and this is important IMHO) has ever shown (or even claimed) that his sexual orientation ever played any role in his work or thought. (Contrast with his weak stomach, which played an enormous role in his attitudes.) So its appropriate status in the article is a passing reference in his biography.

So I don't think the added "fell in love" is necessary, and if someone removes it for redundancy or anachronism, that would be fine by me: I defer to other editors.

But I do object to the idea that there is "gaywashing" going on. It is not gaywashing (deliberately or unconsciously removing references that any inspiring figures were gay when it is established they likely were, because of an anti-gay agenda) to reject speculation in an encyclopedia, and to put academic speculation in footnotes, is it? (On the other hand, it would be entirely appropriate to put him on a list of famous historical figures claimed to have been homosexual).

Erasmus had a capacity to form deep, lifelong friendships with men his own age: More (Erasmus, my darling), Colet, Armonius, etc., and to feel really hurt when slighted. He was definitely homosocial, as you might expect a monk and priest. And you would expect that a young male celebate's male friendships would need to carry more emotional intensity than a married man's. It would not surprise me in the least if Erasmus were indeed homosexual in his orientation too, from our modern perspective: why not?: though nor should we rule out that it was a young man's bromance, either, only atypical because of his literary bent. If it were intellectual-biographically important according to anyone, it might deserve more space in the article. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 03:01, 14 October 2023 (UTC)

Looking at this further, is the problem that passionate attachment is too weak a translation of Erasmus' expression 'fervidos amores'? I don't know. Any Latin experts out there? Rick Jelliffe (talk) 03:13, 14 October 2023 (UTC)

I have adjusted the summary and quotes from CWE Poems editor Vredeveld to better capture his nuance: first he points out that it is a false opposition to say that literary exercises cannot have an autobiographical basis, and second to remove the initial "However" which suggested Vredeveld was necessarily downplaying the love or bromance.

Interested readers might also like to consider how Erasmus and Thomas More expressed their affection for one another without causing any scandal: see the note in de Copia and the quotes in Thomas_More#Personality_according_to_Erasmus Their famous friendship was the basis of the "Erasmus, your darling" hissy fit by Tyndale against More. Also Colloquies#Amicitia_(Friendship) is a good general read on what Erasmus thought schoolkids should be taught about friendship as a rare and enobling thing.Rick Jelliffe (talk) 04:32, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

References

Routemap

I have added the following routemap

Cities and Routes of Erasmus
Oxford, Cambridge London Wokingham Reading Canterbury Deventer Utrecht Calais Steyn Delft Rotterdam St Omer 's-Hertogenbosch Paris, Cambrai Brussels, Antwerp Louvain Turin Cologne Bologna Mainz Strasbourg Florence Freiburg im Breisgau Sienna, Padua Basel Rome, Venice Konstanz Cumae

The justification for this is that Erasmus rarely stayed longer than three years in any location (and he lived to 70) and that these locations were key parts of his story, and this is can very easily be confusing, especially for those of us outside Western Europe who may not have a good grasp of its geography. (Plus he regularly popped over to whichever city his books were being published in, to oversee production.)

Also, so many of his colloquies and event are tied to places (the pilgrimage to Wokingham, the pilgrimage to Canturbury, his participation in the Field of the Cloth of Gold near Calais, his year spent with Aldus Manutius in Venice, and so on.)

I didn't see any way to show his individual trips (e.g. he went to England 5 times, to Paris numerous ties, to Italy twice, and so on) so I think this is a good compromise.

I used the places in the Wikipedia article, plus several biographies as source, such as CCEL and Huizinga, so I don't think there is any original research it. It uses the Wikipedia Routemap tags, so it can be maintained by anyone. It is pretty much North-South like a map: the red are trips he would have made on horseback or carriage, the blue is trips he would have made by boat (English Channel, Rhein River). (The Green is his first 25 years in the Netherlands.) Places he stayed only passingly are shown in a lighter colour. The thin line at the bottom is when he crossed the Alps.

On a larger level, a picture is worth a thousand words, especially if you are a "visual thinker" I guess. So also I hope it might stimulate contributors on other pages to take up this great facility of Wikipedia's!

Anyway, talk and help is very welcome.

• After reading this, I understand what is going on and agree that it adds value. But I think the meaning of the colours, shading, etc need to be explained in the article, since they're not obvious. Does the template allow one to include a legend? Furius (talk) 20:43, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

Y Routemap does allow a footnote: I have added some extra info (and may try to improve it following reflection, as of course, can anyone: though I think it is best if super-terse?) Rick Jelliffe (talk) 02:44, 24 October 2023 (UTC)

Brilliant! Furius (talk) 19:52, 24 October 2023 (UTC)

Catholic Priest or Roman Catholic Priest?

• Original lead said Erasmus was Catholic priest
• User HenryRoan adds "Roman", saying "Article says that he was Roman Catholic"
• User Johnbod reverts saying "same difference"
• I undid reversion saying "Not all Catholic priests are Roman Catholic priests: there are Maronite Catholic priests for example. Erasmus clearly was a Roman Catholic priest. So the reason given for removing the "Roman" is not adequate; however, it is not a big deal."
• User Johnbod re-reverts saying "I know, but Erasmus was clearly not a Ukrainian Uniate etc, & the rest of the article just uses Catholic, rightly. Take it to talk if you must." Unfortunately, this also removes some other changes.
• I re-did those changes, but kept "Roman" deleted, to comply with WP:3RR.

I have more sympathy for allowing "Roman Catholic" there because

1. it is respectful to HenryRoan
2. it is more precise
3. Johnbod's reason is not convincing
4. I know that some Anglicans and Lutherans consider themselves or their churches Catholic (because they say the Creed, or are established): the term is not univocal and therefore it is not a great evil to be precise in the lead.
5. That the article uses plain "Catholic" in other places does not mean that "Roman Catholic" must be banned. Anyway, it is factually wrong that only "Catholic" is used elsewhere: there is one use of "Roman Catholicism".

In reviewing the article for this, I note that the Legacy>Catholic section, "Catholic Easter Vigil mass" is incorrect (too general) and "Roman Catholic Easter Vigil mass" is correct (AFAIK the renewal of baptismal promises is not part of the rites of the non-Roman Catholic-Churches, so I will change that. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 19:04, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

I see you are still edit-warring about this! There has been a vast amount of discussion of this at many pages, in particular Catholic Church; I don't remember seeing you there. One factor you don't seem aware of is that a high proportion of "Roman Catholics" find that term annoying, bordering on offensive, and that for someone (or two people) who are presumably not RC themselves to impose that term on a Catholic priest seems inappropriate/POV. User HenryRoan, a very new editor, needs to learn that when changing a high-traffic article, a better rationale than "Article says that he was Roman Catholic" (whatever that means) is needed. What on earth does "to comply with WP:3RR" mean?? Crazy. Johnbod (talk) 20:08, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

WP:3RR is Wikipedia's 3 reversions per day policy. Look it up. WP:3RR, which is on the page on actual edit-warring.

By the way, I am a Catholic, and a Roman Catholic at that: I have never met a Roman Catholic who found "Roman Catholic" offensive when used by a Catholic or in a non-perjorative way, in Australia.

According to Roman_Catholic_(term)#20th_century Roman Catholic is not offensive to Americans but is in fact the preferred distinguishing term.04:21, 14 October 2023 (UTC)

Really? I find that hard to believe frankly. It certainly doesn't work that way in Europe. I don't know about Australia, but how often do you find "Roman Catholic" used in Catholic writing for a Catholic audience? Very rarely, I'd suggest. You should drop the time-wasting stick. Johnbod (talk) 18:43, 14 October 2023 (UTC)

The issue is not what shorthand Catholics use privately, but whether "Roman" is always redundant. Clearly it sometimes carries specific meaning, and is useful to keep things clear if different populations of English-reading Wikipedia users have different understanding, therefore to remove it willy nilly without providing an adequate substitute is simply bad editing.

By the way Johnbod, it makes you sound like a troll when, right after saying something is borderline offensive (without providing evidence, i.e., a citation), you immediately accuse people (on no evidence) of being part or not part of some religious group. Could you please be less inflammatory in the talk? Rick Jelliffe (talk) 11:56, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

I tell you what, you look to your own language, & I'll look to mine. I'll remind you (again) I was just reverting to the long-term version. Johnbod (talk) 12:15, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

Splitting proposal

The current article is over 100kb long which Wikipedia:Splitting#Size_split says almist certainky should be split. Plus the material proposed for splitting is non-controversial and a good chunk. So I propose that the sections "Writings" and "Works" including all the book and publication lists should be moved to a new Article "Works of Erasmus". Some of the material from the On Free Will and New Testament sections may belong there too. This would leave the Erasmus article to be mainly biographical.

I believe it meets the criteria where I can make a bold action, however I wanted to check if there are any better ideas or reasons not to, etc. before going ahead. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 03:32, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

Go for it. You are a major contributor to the article, seem to know quite a lot about Erasmus. And I believe the split will serve the readership further..Paradise Chronicle (talk) 03:57, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

That size should only be determined by readable prose size, not byte size of the entire article. It says that on the page you linked. Is the readable prose size of this article too large? Because at a glance it doesn’t look like it. SaturatedFatts (talk) 07:59, 18 July 2023 (UTC)

When I cut the (non-footer) text from the browser (so there is no markup), save to a text file, and do a character count (using linux wc), it gives a bit over 97,626 characters and 14,800 words. So, yes,I think the readable prose of the rendered pages is too big.

B.t.w. According to XTextXTools https://xtools.wmcloud.org/articleinfo/en.wikipedia.org/erasmus the total raw file size including markup is 125kb. But it gives a prose size (of the unrendered page) of 49,466 and a word count of 8,000 words. I believe the prose count on XTextXTools is wrong, and based on an old version of the article: in fact there is a warning at the top of the XTextXTools report page that "some data may be inaccurate". (I checked that it was not encoding difference: that the cut-and-paste was not saving to UTF-16.)Rick Jelliffe (talk) 04:23, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Hi Rick Jeliffe, the article has still many citation needed tags, is missing inline citations etc. and unverifiable sources. I guess a lot of what is written can be removed if there is no source for it. What sections do you intend to move to a works by Erasmus article? I'd appreciate if you move only sourced content. But I'll help you a bit to get the article in shape. Paradise Chronicle (talk) 06:58, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Thanks!

I have been going through the article for the last half-year putting in citations where they are marked, and removing material where I cannot find the citation or where it is wrong. I think there are relatively few "citation required" tags now. I have also reviewed quite a few of the citations: The Wikilibrary access has been invaluable for this! Congratulations to whoever organized it! I have gone back to some previously blasted material to re-add it with citations, as I think there were some good contributions in the past. I have also tried to put in more graphical material (routemap, timeline, pictures from Wikisource) and more list-y less text-y material.

So, because I am actively doing this, I would really prefer if inadequately cited material were kept (or checked!) for now (2023?), if you don't mind, not just blasted. (There is another page that was vandalized by a guy removing all uncited sentences, so that some of the sentences left were cited but utterly non-sensical in their meaning as they lost context. Obsessive slash and burn can be counter-productive.) It is one thing to cull an article no-one is maintaining, after a few years of inactivity, but another to cull one that is being worked on.

Also, I and others tend to avoid putting citations to the same book or article multiple times in a run of paragraphs: so this can make it appear that the article has uncited text. I want to audit the article for this, to make more use of < ref name="XXX" .

So apart from not just removing uncited sections yet, what would be good? Yes: adding even more "citation required" tags where there are none. And double-checking that the cited journals etc do justify the phrase in the article.

As a side note, I would expect that the new article on Works of Erasmus would indeed (pretty much) be well-cited. It depends on how much material about on Free Will goes into: I think some of that material belongs in the existing strange article about On Free Will, or, better, into a new article on Erasmus and his alter ego Martin Luther. (That page would be subject to another split discussion, I am not suggesting it now.)

In general, I think the big problem with the articles on Erasmus is not that they are unsourced, but that the sources (explicit or implicit) often come from partisan sources (e.g. 19th Century Protestant and Catholic, both anti- or pro-Erasmian) that cannot resist sticking in unfounded commentary, or cod psychologizing. So even if officially WP:RS because they are academic books, we need to be careful to distinguish between what an academic historian says and what is true: those little phrases of spin... Rick Jelliffe (talk) 06:07, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Readable prose size is 40kb, far under 100kb. What are you talking about?? – Aza24 (talk) 03:51, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Where do you get your count from? As I wrote, the Xtools count is wrong (I called it Xtext by mistake: now corrected): indeed, the Xtools report warns "This page is very old. Some data may be inaccurate due to how revisions were stored in the early days of MediaWiki." I have described my method of counting words above using wc in the rendered text, which excludes tags, which got, then, 97,626 characters and 14,800 words.Rick Jelliffe (talk) 12:06, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

As of Feb 2024, the Page Length of the Info menu item gives 367,634 bytes. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 16:08, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

Y Following the article being tagged recently as too long, I have split out two sections into a new article Works of Erasmus. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 01:06, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Next Split? An editor has marked the article as too long again, and deleted the quotes section. (I didn't care for the quotes section much, either, though I think talking about Erasmus without samples from him is a bit like painting about music.) I have recovered some of the quotes and put them into the relevant Works of Erasmus sections.

I have also reduced the entries in the Infobox, and rejigged some sections and headings to be more topical (which may help future splits?) in particular the "Interpretation Caveats" subsection that used to be a rather quibbly attachment under "Turks and Jews" is now an earlier subsection "Manner of expression".

But I don't see a clear way to split the article, unless it is to just take the whole Thoughts of Erasmus section into a different article. But that just leaves the article as a biography which (though quite interesting as a traveller and networker) is not enlightening about what makes Erasmus notable. Anyone have any ideas? I don't think there is much scope for the current article to grow more, at least: I think most of the important bases are covered, though it might be that article is relative light on political, legal and pedagogical details.

Another approach would be to split out the section on Catholic and Protestant Reform into its own article: it would not reduce the main article that much, however it might allow more material on Erasmus versus Luther, Erasmus versus Zwingli, etc. It could have the sections on Protestant and Catholic evaluation from the Evaluations and Legacy section too, I guess. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 09:07, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

Second Splitting Proposal

I am proposing to split the article further, by making another page "Life of Erasmus". This is motivated that even after the previous split to Works of Erasmus, the article is large and an editor re-flagged it for splitting. I already added extra sub-headings, in case that was useful.

In concrete terms:

1. Make new page Life of Erasmus with minimal lead.
2. Move Biography section over
3. Add Main tag and 1 para biography to main article
4. Move over Personal/Clothing, Representations, signet ring and personal motto, and exhumation to Life of Erasmus
5. Fix citations

I am thinking that making a Life of Erasmus article would be better than, say, a Thought of Erasmus because of topic cohesion (and ease) and because his notable thought is probably what people are more interested than his interesting life? Rick Jelliffe (talk) 02:56, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Y I have split the article again. Instead of the Life of Erasmus idea or the Thought of Erasmus idea, which I think would go against the expectations that the main article is about life and ideas, I have split out the Legacy and Evaluations sections (and the Character Attacks section) into a new article Legacy and Evaluations of Erasmus.

This new article is a good chunk of the main article:

HTML document size: 555 kB
Prose size (including all HTML code): 55 kB
References (including all HTML code): 230 kB
Wiki text: 123 kB
Prose size (text only): 33 kB (5125 words) "readable prose size"
References (text only): 28 kB

So I am removing the "this article is too long and needs to be split header." However, it may be that even with this second split (the first made the Works of Erasmus article, some may feel the article is too long. I agree it is still long, but given his complicated life and extraordinarily broad influence in so many areas, there may be some value in keeping things together, despite the length? Concrete ideas would be useful, of course. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 06:15, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Content Rating

Before Aug 5 2024, the Erasmus article had a B rating but has clearly become too long. The editor Tpbradbury flagged it as too long and moved the content rating to C on account of the size. On Aug 10, about 1/3 of the article was split out into new article Legacy and Evaluations of Erasmus. I have not moved the rating back to B yet (on the grounds that if a B article is moved to C because it is too big, and then substantially split, it should be B again) to give editors a chance to comment (or in case it is not the way things are done), but I propose to do so within a week if that is OK? Or some other editor might like to do it first? Rick Jelliffe (talk) 00:36, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

4 periods

The current text of the Biography starts with "Erasmus's almost 70 years can be divided into quarters" then gives them; which has been tagged "according to whom". I think the tag misses the point: it is not an invocation to unspecified authorities, but a summary of the following information.

I think such a summary is highly needed due to the lengthy and complex bio section. I will change the "can "to "may" and add "overview" as an unnecssary heading. Rick Jelliffe (talk) 12:51, 23 May 2024 (UTC)