Eztabaida:Sinestun zahar

NPOV: "Raskolniki" or "Old Believers"?

It is most regrettable to find an article about Old Believers in the 21st century, still calling them "Raskolniki" (schismatics). The term "raskolnik" is an unambiguous pejorative term, used in the past (especially before 1905) by the opponents of the Old Believers: the Russian Orthodox Synodal State Church and the government of the Russian Empire. No doubt one will find many - mostly outdated - sources, among which may even occur encylopeadias - stating that "Old Believers" and "Raskolniki" are the same thing.

Perhaps you are willing to trust and believe a person from Russia, knowing the Russian language and Russian history, when I say that "raskolnik" means above all "schismatic", i.e. any schismatic, not particularly Old Believers. In 1905 Tsar Nicholas II prohibited referring to Old Believers as "raskolniki," which underlines how abusive this word actually is when used to refer to Old Believers.

By using the biased term "raskolnik", you should realise that you're actually violating NPOV. Besides, it was the Russian Orthodox Synodal State Church and the Russian Empire in the 18th and 19th century considering Old Believers "raskolniki" - why should Wikipedians anno 2011 adopt a clearly biased point of view that evidenlty isn't their own? I don't understand this.

I’d like to point out that both the Russian-Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate and the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad for a long time do not refer to Old Believers as “raskolniki”, an unambiguously pejorative term. The Moscow Patriarchate has also urged its members to refrain from using any polemic literature on the Old Believers, published before the Revolution of 1917 and not without reason. All of these publications present the Old Believers issue from a biased point of view with only one single purpose: discreditation. Until 1905 the Old Believers had no civil rights and could not publicly refute false accusations made against them.

Let this be clear: one doesn't take sides with the Old Believers by calling them "Old Believers", but one does take sides with the Russian Synodal State Church of the 18th and 19th century calling Old Believers "raskolniki".

Given the above-mentioned facts and arguments, I'd like to request you to change "raskolniki" into "Old Believers," in order to adhere to neutrality and to Wikipedia's policy of neutrality. Vasilij 13:35, 31 abendua 2011 (UTC)

Egiaztatua eta zuzendua. --Xabier Armendaritz 2012-01-02, 09:24